Radio waves that kill Cancer....

[tcarcio]

I saw this today and I thought,Wouldn't it be great if this pans out. My mom died of cancer and I couldn't help but think,What If. Hopefully this will work and help people that will get the disease. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/10/60minutes/main4006951.shtml

 

[mtrycrafts]

I saw this today and I thought,Wouldn't it be great if this pans out. My mom died of cancer and I couldn't help but think,What If. Hopefully this will work and help people that will get the disease. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/10/60minutes/main4006951.shtml

Yes, I saw that in 08 when it aired. I wonder where it is today. It is a microwave machine for a specific substance.

 

[mtrycrafts]

I saw this today and I thought,Wouldn't it be great if this pans out. My mom died of cancer and I couldn't help but think,What If. Hopefully this will work and help people that will get the disease. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/10/60minutes/main4006951.shtml

I missed last night's 60 minutes that had a follow up on him. The inventor died of his cancer, unfortunately. His device didn't become operational in humans in time. But, the research is ongoing and very promising.

 

[Swerd]

I missed last night's 60 minutes that had a follow up on him. The inventor died of his cancer, unfortunately. His device didn't become operational in humans in time. But, the research is ongoing and very promising.

I am a scientist who has worked most of my career in cancer research. I saw both the original 60 Minutes story and last night's follow up.

Although I felt a lot of sympathy and admiration for the inventor, I can't say there is enough info about his invention to say anything much at this point. It is a somewhat different idea, but needs years of work before it can be tested in cancer patients. It may end up being hardly any different from X-ray therapy that is often used today.

The biggest problem I see with his method is injecting the gold particles in such a way that they attach only to cancer cells and not normal ones. It will require monoclonal antibodies that recognize and bind to specific cell-surface markers on the cancer cells. We've been working on those for over 20 years with limited success. The major problem is that when you inject them, some do get to the cancer cells, but most get rapidly cleared by the liver and kidneys. If that happens in patients, when the radio waves come on, it could do lethal damage to those organs.

At least 60 Minutes was honest enough to discuss all this with the oncologist from Houston who had teamed up with the inventor. He laid it out straight when he said he thought it was at least 4 years away from clinical testing. And he may have been a bit optimistic.

 

[lsiberian]

I am a scientist who has worked most of my career in cancer research. I saw both the original 60 Minutes story and last night's follow up.

Although I felt a lot of sympathy and admiration for the inventor, I can't say there is enough info about his invention to say anything much at this point. It is a somewhat different idea, but needs years of work before it can be tested in cancer patients. It may end up being hardly any different from X-ray therapy that is often used today.

The biggest problem I see with his method is injecting the gold particles in such a way that they attach only to cancer cells and not normal ones. It will require monoclonal antibodies that recognize and bind to specific cell-surface markers on the cancer cells. We've been working on those for over 20 years with limited success. The major problem is that when you inject them, some do get to the cancer cells, but most get rapidly cleared by the liver and kidneys. If that happens in patients, when the radio waves come on, it could do lethal damage to those organs.

At least 60 Minutes was honest enough to discuss all this with the oncologist from Houston who had teamed up with the inventor. He laid it out straight when he said he thought it was at least 4 years away from clinical testing. And he may have been a bit optimistic.

If your terminal it may be worth the risk though.

 

[Swerd]

If your terminal it may be worth the risk though.

The inventor certainly had that kind of motivation.

In phase 1 clinical trials, the first clinical tests of a new experimental drug or treatment, the goal is to find a safe dose that patients can tolerate. Usually the patients who volunteer for these trials have advanced metastatic cancer and have already received other treatments that didn't work. They are often as motivated as the radio wave treatment inventor on 60 Minutes.

However, there are other things to consider besides the patients' extreme desire to get an effective treatment. These trials are experiments on humans, and they must be carefully designed to avoid any possibility of abuse. It usually requires that any new treatment first be thoroughly tested on animals (mice, rats, dogs, or monkeys) to find what dose levels are toxic, and what kind of toxic effects to expect in humans. This takes time and money. Once a toxic dose in lab animals is known, human trials can start (usually at a 10-fold lower dose accounting for body weight). Then the dose can be carefully increased in steps, until patients develop unacceptable toxicity. All this is done under the careful supervision of hospital institutional review boards and the FDA.

For the radio wave treatment shown in 60 Minutes, none of this pre-clinical work has been done yet. So to jump prematurely into clinical trials on humans would be unethical (no licensed oncologist would do it without risk of loosing his license) and illegal. Any manufacturer of the product would face legal action by the FDA.

Sorry for the long answer, but this is what I do for a living.

 

[lsiberian]

The inventor certainly had that kind of motivation.

In phase 1 clinical trials, the first clinical tests of a new experimental drug or treatment, the goal is to find a safe dose that patients can tolerate. Usually the patients who volunteer for these trials have advanced metastatic cancer and have already received other treatments that didn't work. They are often as motivated as the radio wave treatment inventor on 60 Minutes.

However, there are other things to consider besides the patients' extreme desire to get an effective treatment. These trials are experiments on humans, and they must be carefully designed to avoid any possibility of abuse. It usually requires that any new treatment first be thoroughly tested on animals (mice, rats, dogs, or monkeys) to find what dose levels are toxic, and what kind of toxic effects to expect in humans. This takes time and money. Once a toxic dose in lab animals is known, human trials can start (usually at a 10-fold lower dose accounting for body weight). Then the dose can be carefully increased in steps, until patients develop unacceptable toxicity. All this is done under the careful supervision of hospital institutional review boards and the FDA.

For the radio wave treatment shown in 60 Minutes, none of this pre-clinical work has been done yet. So to jump prematurely into clinical trials on humans would be unethical (no licensed oncologist would do it without risk of loosing his license) and illegal. Any manufacturer of the product would face legal action by the FDA.

Sorry for the long answer, but this is what I do for a living.

I actually appreciate the post. You are an expert on the field and should be the one commenting. I know folks are working hard to cure cancer. Early detection is still the best defense from what I've been told.