The latest health news on skin healing is moist wound healing.  You have a skin wound and whether it be a cut, abrasion, road rash, or simple skin breakdown, there are new ways to help the healing process along.  In the past, we stuck on a Bandaid, waited for a scab to form and when the scab cracked open, waited for the healing process to begin again.
New theories on wound healing, however,  promote healthy skin development by healing from the inside out, therefore reducing scar formation.

Moist wound healing is the newest process of healing skin wounds.  Why don’t you try the bench mark wound therapy used in hospitals today?  This process is known as moist wound healing. How do you do it?  The following is a step-by-step process of how you can use this new technique:  First, make sure you don’t have a complicated wound that may be infected or is deeper than a simple burn or a bed sore etc.   If so, or you are unsure, seek appropriate medical care and advice from you doctor or emergency department.

1. Wash your hands thoroughly with soap and water.

2. Make a solution of saline (0.9% sodium chloride)  Or purchase sterile saline solution from a pharmacy. It must be a sterile solution.  Check out web recipes from a reputable source such as your local health unit or community care access site.

3. Bathe the wound in the sterile saline solution.  Make sure it is room temperature.  It should not sting.  This sterile saline solution reduces inflammation, purges the wound of debris and/or any bacteria.
Let it air dry for a few minutes.

4. Apply Tegaderm, a product made by 3M.  It is a breathable yet occlusive dressing.  There are demonstrations on various websites including YouTube on how to apply.  I’ve added the Youtube video here for you to see how it’s done.

5. Allow dressing to stay in place as long as it adheres to the skin unless there is yellowish drainage or obvious infection indicated by such symptoms as yellow drainage or redness.

6. Repeat daily or even twice daily if necessary.

7. Above all, seek physician care if the healing is not going well, or you any questions or worries whatsoever.

The principals behind moist wound healing are:  Moist healing promotes healing of the skin from within, from the dermis to the epidermis layers.  Don’t put anything on a wound that you wouldn’t put in your eye !!!  That means no rubbing alcohol, or soap!!!

Watch the process of moist wound healing in the following video:

Most recently, in health news in the media, we’ve been hearing the news on a possible HIV cure. This renews interest and hope in finding a cure for this disease. Recently German scientists used a bone marrow transplant for a cancer patient who also had AIDS and discovered that the virus had been eradicated. Four years later, this patient still shows no sign of the HIV infection in his system. This news, HIV which has killed over 25 million people worldwide since the 1980s, certainly renews hope that scientists may be able to use bone marrow transplant technology in the treatment of people with HIV. The research is still to be followed up. This HIV health news is written by Maggie Fox of Reuters.

Doctors declare ‘cure’ in HIV patient

German researchers who used a bone marrow transplant to treat a cancer patient with the AIDS virus, have declared him cured of the virus — a stunning claim in a field where the word “cure” is barely whispered.

The patient, who had both HIV infection and leukemia, received the bone marrow transplant in 2007 from a donor who had a genetic mutation known to give patients a natural immunity to the virus.
Nearly four years after the transplant, the patient is free of the virus and it does not appear to be hiding anywhere in his body, Thomas Schneider of Berlin Charite hospital and colleagues said.

“Our results strongly suggest that cure of HIV has been achieved in this patient,” they wrote in the journal Blood. AIDS researchers have rejected the approach on any kind of scale for patients with HIV. A bone marrow transplant is a last-ditch treatment for cancers such as leukemia.

It requires destruction of a patient’s own bone marrow — itself a harrowing process — and then a transplant from a donor who has a near-exact blood and immune system type. Months of recovery are needed while the transplant grows and reconstitutes the patient’s immune system.

“It’s not practical and it can kill people,” said Dr. Robert Gallo of the Institute of Human Virology at the University of Maryland, who helped discover the human immunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS.

“It is possibly a cure, that’s for sure, you won’t know for absolute sure until the person dies and undergoes extreme PCR (genetic) analysis of post-mortem tissue.”

The mutation affects a receptor, a cellular doorway, called CCR5, that the AIDS virus uses to get into the cells it infects.

Since the 1990s scientists have known that some people, mostly of Northern European descent, have the mutation and are rarely infected with HIV.

“They are uninfectable, virtually,” Gallo said.
Some researchers are working on the idea of gene therapy to treat or try to cure HIV, but the technology is still in experimental stages.

“I don’t want to throw cold water on an interesting thing, but that’s what it is — an interesting thing,” Gallo said.

Schneider’s team has been following the patient, taking samples from his colon, liver, spinal fluid and brain as he developed various conditions that justified the tests. They tested all these samples for evidence of the virus, which can be difficult to detect unless it is actively infecting cells.

All these places are suspected “reservoirs” where HIV can hide out for years, to rebound in patients who stop taking drugs that suppress the infection.

This patient appears to have a fully functioning immune system, they found, which appears genetically identical to cells from the donor — not the patient’s own immune cells. Schneider’s team found no evidence of HIV anywhere.

“From these results, it is reasonable to conclude that cure of HIV infection has been achieved in this patient,” they wrote.

The AIDS virus infects 33 million people globally and has killed more than 25 million since the pandemic began in the 1980s. Cocktails of strong drugs can suppress the virus, keeping patients healthy and reducing the chance they will infect others, but there is no vaccine.

How much fiber should I eat and why eat fiber? Fiber intake is linked to decreased risk of heart disease, diabetes, obesity and certain cancer types.  North Americans eat less than half as much fiber as they should.

What is fiber?  Fiber is complex carbohydrates and natural polymers such as cellulose and woody plant lignin. Fiber also consists of various gums such as guar, arabic, agar and carrageen, and psyllium. Fiber is divided into two sub-categories: Insoluble and Soluble.

Insoluble fiber makes stool heavier, speeds passage through the gut.  It controls and balances pH in intestine.  It is like  a sponge, absorbs many times its’ weight in water, helping to eliminate feces and relieve constipation.  Examples of insoluble fiber you should add to your diet include:  wheat bran, whole grains, corn bran, skin of fruit, vegetables, and seeds.

Soluble fiber is pectin and different gums and is found in brown rice, oats, legumes (peas, kidney beans, lentils) barley, fruit, some vegetables such as broccoli and potatoes, nuts, flax, psyllium husk.  Evidence shows that soluble fiber may lessen heart disease by reducing the amount of cholesterol in the blood.  It also slows gastric emptying, and regulates blood sugar.

Fiber Benefits for Diabetics

Fiber benefits for diabetics show that it is especially helpful for people with either form of diabetes by controlling blood sugar by delaying gastric emptying, thus slowing the entry of glucose into the bloodstream.  It also decreases postprandial rise in blood sugar by delaying absorption of glucose in the small intestine. Furthermore,  people with diabetes benefit in that it may lessen insulin requirements for type 1 diabetics.

Other benefits to increasing dietary fiber include:

• Heart health
• cholesterol lowering effects,
• Combats constipation
• Possible cancer protection.   Bacteria convert fiber to short chain fatty acids, which provide energy for the body and protect against bowel and breast cancers.

How much fiber should I eat?  At least 26 grams/daily.  The average North American intake is 4.5-11 grams/day.  It is recommended that people with diabetes consume 25-50 grams daily.

Always remember increase fluids when you increase fiber !

What to Eat: Ten Ways to Increase Fiber

1. Choose a high fiber cereal, > 4 gm/serving
2. Sprinkle a very high fiber(>10 gm) cereal on your regular cereal.
3. Eat more fruit, limit juice.
4. Add one more vegetable to your diet daily.
5. Add beans or lentils to your salad, spaghetti sauce or soup.
6. Choose 100% whole grain (better than whole wheat) breads and pasta.
7. Add 75 mls or ¼ cup of wheat bran, oat bran or flax to baking
8. Use hummus or bean dips instead of mustard or mayo on sandwiches
9. Add dried fruit, nuts or seeds to cereal.
10.Use ½ whole wheat flour and ½ white floor for baking.

Last but not least…………

READ LABELS!!!!

5 – 10 servings a day
Fruits & vegetables
Apple = 3 grams fiber
Pear = 5 grams fiber
Peas = 9 grams fiber in ½ cup
Dark Rye Bread = 5 grams fiber/slice
Chick Peas = 12 grams fiber in 1 cup
Broccoli = 7 grams fiber in ¾ cup

For years now, aspirin has been called the “wonder drug.”  What this has meant is that by taking a daily low dosage of aspirin, it has been found that aspirin benefits us as an anti-inflammatory and helps prevent heart disease.

Now it seems after research which took place over four years, Peter Rothwell of the University of Oxford writes in an article published in the Lancet, the medical journal, it has been found that aspirin may slightly reduce the cancer risk by about 20 per cent for colon cancer as well as other cancers such as esophagus cancer, lung cancer, and gastrointestinal cancers.

There may be a drawback for some people though.  The daily usage of aspirin can cause stomach bleeding and bleeding in the intestines of some people.

The benefits for women taking a low dose aspirin have not been determined for sure as only a few women were used in the study.  It is not known if the risk of breast cancer is reduced.  The study was only performed with men who took 75 mg of aspirin a day.  Have a conversation with your doctor if you think that you should be taking a low dose of aspirin on a daily basis.  The study is not conclusive and this is perhaps the reason why you should speak to your doctor first before beginning to take a baby aspirin everyday for its health benefits.

In this breast cancer update, researchers have found a major breast cancer causing gene called the ZNF703.  ZNF703 is one of the first genes discovered to play a key role in aggressive breast cancers.  This “oncogene” is the first to be found in the last five years.

Breast cancer gene research

It causes an aggressive form of breast cancer and is an overactive gene in one of 12 breast cancers.

Scientists believe that this ZNF703 gene should be identified as a target for new drug treatment therapies.

Her2 is another oncogene which was discovered by scientists during breast cancer research earlier on.  After the identification of Her2, the breast cancer drug Herceptic was created to eliminate Her2 gene breast cancers.

An oncogene in healthy cells causes cell division.  However, if it becomes unbalanced and overactive, it will create havoc with the cell division process.

Scientists studied gene activity both breast cancer cells grown in a lab and 1,172 breast tumor samples. By a process of elimination of  genes in the tumor samples, only the ZNF703 gene was left within the breast cancer cells which remained overactive. In breast cancer patients, ZNF703 was the only overactive gene that was driving the breast cancer.

Researchers at the British Columbia Cancer Agency in Vancouver, Canada and the Cambridge Research Institute in Britain did the research.  This research was published in the EMBO website at embomolmed.org.
It is hoped that this discovery of the oncogene ZNF703 will lead to better breast cancer treatments in the future to treat cancers that are resistant to standard hormone therapies.

Dr Rachel Greig, of Breakthrough Breast Cancer said the research was “a vital step in understanding the genes that drive the growth of some types of breast cancer”.

Health news from the media tonight reported that there is a blood test for cancer.  Could this be the next medical game changer?  The blood test for cancer technology was discovered by Boston scientists and is owned by Johnson & Johnson.  Johnson & Johnson is promising to help bring this new blood test to the market.

Blood Test for Cancer: Photo MSNBC

How long will it take?  It is expected it will take Johnson & Johnson about two years to bring this blood test for cancer to the market. This simple blood test could then be available in your doctor’s office.  This year, four cancer centers will begin studies on the cancer blood test.

This new blood test is so sensitive that it can identify a single cancer cell among masses of healthy blood cells.  This single cell could become indicative of major cancers such as colon cancer, breast cancer, lung and prostate cancers developing in the future.  This test would be like a liquid biopsy, removing the need for painful tissue sampling.  It could even replace painful mammograms and colonoscopies.

The blood test for cancer shows lots of potential and could prove more reliable than diagnosing tumors through needle biopsies which don’t always provide enough of a sample for doctors to evaluate and then prescribe a possible method of treatment.

The following excerpt of this exciting health news from MSNBC.com explains further.

The only test on the market now to find tumor cells in blood — CellSearch, made by J&J’s Veridex unit — just gives a cell count. It doesn’t capture whole cells that doctors can analyze to choose treatments.

Interest in trying to collect these cells soared in 2007, after Haber and his colleagues published a study of Mass General’s test. It is far more powerful than CellSearch and traps cells intact. It requires only a couple of teaspoons of blood and can be done repeatedly to monitor treatment or determine why a drug has stopped working and what to try next.

“That’s what got the scientific community’s interest,” Kris said. Doctors can give a drug one day and sample blood the next day to see if the circulating tumor cells are gone, he explained.

The test uses a microchip that resembles a lab slide covered in 78,000 tiny posts, like bristles on a hairbrush. The posts are coated with antibodies that bind to tumor cells. When blood is forced across the chip, cells ping off the posts like balls in a pinball machine. The cancer cells stick, and stains make them glow so researchers can count and capture them for study.

The test can find one cancer cell in a billion or more healthy cells, said Mehmet Toner, a Harvard University bioengineer who helped design it. Researchers know this because they spiked blood samples with cancer cells and then searched for them with the chip.

Studies of the chip have been published in the journals Nature, the New England Journal of Medicine and Science Translational Medicine. It is the most promising of several dozen that companies and universities are rushing to develop to capture circulating tumor cells, said Bob McCormack, technology chief for Veridex.

The agreement announced Monday will have Veridex and J&J’s Ortho Biotech Oncology unit work to improve the microchip, including trying a cheaper plastic to make it practical for mass production. No price goal has been set, a company official said, but the current CellSearch test costs several hundred dollars.

The latest health news for men is reporting that Finasteride a brand name medication known as Propecia for treating baldness in men has been shown to cause breast cancer. Other health news reports that the drug named Proscar which is used to treat enlarged prostate is also reported as causing breast cancer in men. Although it is not known definitely is finasteride actually causes male breast cancer, patients are being warned to report any symptoms such as nipple discharge, soreness or lumps to their doctors immediately. The following health news comes from Health Canada.

Health Canada says labels are being changed on finasteride drugs to add safety information on rare reports of breast cancer in men.

Finasteride is a prescription drug sold under the brand name Propecia, used for the treatment of male pattern hair loss, and the brand name Proscar, for treating a non-cancerous enlarged prostate.

A Health Canada statement issued Thursday says male breast cancer has been reported in a small number of patients around the world using both the one-milligram and five-milligram formulations of the drug.

It says most reports have been associated with the five-milligram dosage.

However, the agency says based on available evidence, it’s not known for sure that finasteride can cause breast cancer — only that the possibility can’t be ruled out.

It says patients taking finasteride should report any changes in their breasts to their doctor.
Changes might include breast enlargement, lumps, tenderness, pain or nipple discharge.

In the most recent health news:  Cancer drug tests in the U.K. were recently stopped early because of the impressive success of tests for a new prostate cancer drug.  This drug trial was stopped because the drug was so successful at targeting cancer tumours that it was deemed unfair not to offer all the 922 people involved in the drug testing the use of this new cancer drug.  This is exciting health news for suffers of prostate cancer (and potentially other cancers) which an estimated 913,000 men worldwide are diagnosed with each year.  This cancer drug is called an alpha radiation drug which targets the tumors, relieves pain, and patients are found to be living longer.  Scientists are excited with this health news.  This health news first appeared on the BBC news site.

Alpha radiation treats prostate cancers

A trial of a new cancer drug, which accurately targets tumours, has been so successful it has been stopped early.

Doctors at London’s Royal Marsden Hospital gave prostate cancer patients a powerful alpha radiation drug and found that they lived longer, and experienced less pain and side effects.

The medics then stopped the trial of 922 people, saying it was unethical not to offer all of them the treatment.
Lead researcher Dr Chris Parker said it was “a significant step forward”.
Cancer Research UK said it was a very important and promising discovery.
Radiation has been used to treat tumours for more than a century. It damages the genetic code inside cancerous cells.
Alpha particles are the big, bulky, bruisers of the radiation world. It is a barrage of helium nuclei, which are far bigger than beta radiation, a stream of electrons, or gamma waves.  Dr Parker said: “It’s more damaging. It takes one, two, three hits to kill a cancer cell compared with thousands of hits for beta particles.”
Alpha particles also do less damage to surrounding tissue.

He added: “They have such a tiny range, a few millionths of a metre. So we can be sure that the damage is being done where it should be.”
In 90% of patients with advanced prostate cancer, the tumour will have spread to the bone. At this stage there are no treatments which affect survival.
The study looked at patients with these secondary cancers, as the source of radiation – radium-223 chloride – acts like calcium and sticks to bone.
Half were given the radium-223 chloride drug alongside traditional chemotherapy, while the other patients received chemotherapy and a dummy pill.

The death rate was 30% lower in the group taking radium-223. Those patients survived for 14 months on average compared to 11 months in the dummy group.

The trial was abandoned as “it would have been unethical not to offer the active treatment to those taking placebo”, said Dr Parker.  “I think it will be a significant step forward for cancer patients”.

Researchers also said the treatment was safe. Curiously there were fewer side-effects in the group taking the treatment than those taking the dummy medicine.

The findings are being presented at the European Multidisciplinary Cancer Congress but they have not yet been peer-reviewed by other academics.
Prof Gillies McKenna, Cancer Research UK’s radiotherapy expert and director of the Gray Institute for Radiation Oncology and Biology, said: “This appears to be an important study using a highly targeted form of radiation to treat prostate cancer that has spread to the bones.

“This research looks very promising and could be an important addition to approaches available to treat secondary tumours – and should be investigated further.”