dochol@ecsvax.UUCP (Deryl B. Holliday) (06/17/87)
Do you believe than persons can be healed or helped with other than just medical means? There is evidence that a combination of medical, theological, and pyschological means are very helpful. Maybe someone out there has been helped or healed with a wholistic approach. What input would you like to give?
coray@nucsrl.UUCP (Elizabeth) (06/26/87)
I assume the holistic question is being asked because there is some element of desperation, looking for hope along any pathway. Actually, I think the hope lies along the lines of understanding the characteristics of malignant neoplastic cells at the functional level. Historically, most studies of the malignant phenotype have attempted to identify cancer-specific properties, i.e. properties common to all cancer cells, or to all cancer cells of a certain type, but absent in all normal cell types. However, heterogeneity of the properties of the cells in a malignant tumor is a well documented phenomenon. A review is presented by Heppner, 1984. Tumor heteogeneity constitutes a major obstacle to investigations of the pheotype of cancer cells. For this reason, it may not be possible to obtain a biochemical understanding of the pheonotype of cancer cells merely by comparing cancer cells with normal cells. A more accessible approach is based on the assumption that cancer cells can be characterized by possessing a certain combination of properties, each also present in normal cells. The typical properties of the cancer cells, such as their autonomous growth, their invasion into and degradation of normal tissue, and their metastasizing capacity, are all functions of normal cells. A variety of normal cells can effect tissue degradation. Explants of cancer tissue consistently cause proteolytic degradation of the plasma clots on which they are grown. More recently, it was found that release of plasminogen activators from on transformed culture cells induces a massive increase in extracellular proteolytic activity. Current research indicates that plasminogen activators, particularly a plasminogen activator of the urokinase type (u-PA), plays a role in tissue degradation. In particular, the cancer cell secretes a pro-u-PA, which undergoes a transofmation to u-PA, which activates plasminogen to form plasmin, and plasmin is capable of degrading the extracellular matrix. This proteolytic cascade provides a mechanism which explains tissue degradation. In addition, the cancer cell is capable of actually attaching to laminin, thereby allowing it to activate plasmin locally. In short, it would seem that there is a specific mechanism which explains invasiveness. Now, plasminogen activator could also be a nonspecific marker for tumors. If the immunoreactivity of the cancer cell to plasminogen activator is due to the fact that there is actually a receptor site which acts to bind the nonactive part of the plasminogen activator--thereby explaining both the cancer cells relative immunity to the action of plasmin, since the active site is directed away from the cells, and also explaining the cancer cells ability to apply plasminogen activation very locally, then a mechanism exists by which one can deliver a plasminogen "deactivator" to the cancer cell. One way to do this might be if one were able to construct a plasminogen "deactivator" bound to the inactive section of the plasminogen activator (in place of the active site). This plasminogen "deactivator" would then attach to the surface of the cancer cell and inhibit the effect of the pro-u-PA which the cell secretes. This last was entirely theoretical (never let a computer scientist study biochemistry), but it would seem to be a better way of combatting a specific mechanism than a holistic approach. How holistic approaches affect specific mechanisms is never very clear, but as an ex-cancer patient myself, I think it is better to be very well informed than to be hopeful in a general or holistic way. Cancer does not have to be fatal, there are advances being made immediately, and reality has alot more to offer than voodoo. I'd try Advances in Cancer Research to get a start. M.E. Corey "I don't know anything. I'm just a graduate student."
norm@mtgzy.UUCP (n.e.andrews) (06/30/87)
If memory serves me, a Kentucky company, Biotherapeutics, takes some of a client's cancer cells, cultures them in separate dishes, and tries out the effectiveness of many possible therapies on the cancer colonies. It may not really be a shot-gun approach... Anyway, their success rate might be something worth looking into. Norm Andrews AT&T Information Systems Room MT-2C402 200 Laurel Avenue Middletown, New Jersey 07748 (201)957-5786 vax135!mtuxo!mtgzy!norm
robert@uop.UUCP (Robert McCaul) (07/01/87)
a few years back i heard of a treatment called: (unsure of spelling) Coley's toxins. (i no doubt reveal some ignorance by my own words but..) has anyone done any research regarding these? i heard it was a chain of bacteria injections, that brought upon a fever condition for several days, that aparrantly induces the body to "see" the cancer as an enemy, and attack the growths. or this is how the story goes... also an aside: i was exposed to carcinojenics in large dosages my first two years in community college...and since my mother's father died of luekemia, and my mother of cancer...(i am not asking about "my odds") i am asking what responsibility does that school have? those of us that were exposed, had no idea at the time, (and we were also exposed to cyanide gasses of sufficient quantity to cause sickness) (remind you not to visit the place huh?) what can i do? you may discuss this openly, but since i don't always read these groups for lack of time, i would like to have some replies regarding these matters. thank you all for your time. Somewhere on the Pacific Crest Trail... ....cogent!uop!robert OR .....seismo!lll-crg!ucdavis!uop!robert