Faculty Bibliography

The question of switching arose in December when researchers reported preliminary findings from an ongoing study that aims to compare Arimidex with tamoxifen over five years among more than 9,300 women. The study's authors reported that among the first group of women to complete 33 months of treatment, Arimidex appeared to be slightly more effective and safer than tamoxifen. Because the unpublished findings have implications for hundreds of thousand of patients, the oncology society appointed an 18- member panel in January to assess the effectiveness and safety of Arimidex. The panel analyzed the information from the December report and also reviewed all published articles on the aromatase inhibitor drugs. Tamoxifen is the only drug the Food and Drug Administration has approved to lower a woman's risk of developing breast cancer. The agency has approved the marketing of Arimidex and two other aromatase inhibitor drugs -- Femara (letrozole) and Aromasin (exemestane) -- for the treatment of advanced breast cancer

Precisely why stopping smoking during treatment can be beneficial is not known, said Dr. [Gregory M. Videtic], who now works at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. Because smoking constricts blood vessels, he theorized in an interview that smoking reduced the amount of oxygen that reached cells in the body and might also reduce the amount of drugs that reached the cancer cells. In the search for ways to prevent lung cancer, Dr. [Jonathan Kurie]'s team studied two vitamin A derivatives: 9-cis retinoic acid and 13-cis retinoic acid combined with alpha-tocopherol (a synthetic form of vitamin E). The 13-cis form has been shown to have an effect on head and neck cancers. The researchers found that after three months, 9-cis retinoic acid had increased the amount of the protein while the 13-cis retinoic acid therapy had not. Side effects like headache, skin rashes and fatigue were more common in the 9-cis retinoic acid group. But neither form of retinoic acid reduced the number of precancerous cells

In reviewing the patients' medical records, [Gregory M. Videtic] and Larry Stitt of the London Regional Cancer Center found information about the smoking history of 186. Of these, 107 had quit before beginning treatment, and 79 continued to smoke during treatment. The records did not say how much the patients smoked

Precisely why stopping smoking during treatment can be beneficial is not known, said [Gregory M. Videtic], who now works at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. Because smoking constricts blood vessels, he theorized in an interview that smoking reduced the amount of oxygen that reached cells in the body and might also reduce the amount of drugs that reached the cancer cells. While stopping smoking reduces the chance of developing lung cancer, people who quit still remain at high risk of the disease for many years. About half of all lung cancers occur in people who have stopped smoking for at least a year, said Dr. Jonathan Kurie of the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. In the search for ways to prevent lung cancer, Kurie's team studied two vitamin A derivatives: 9-cis retinoic acid and 13-cis retinoic acid combined with alpha-tocopherol (a synthetic form of vitamin E). The 13-cis form has been shown to have an effect on head and neck cancers

[Robert Stevens] worked in an office, in a state where no anthrax had been reported in years. And inhalation anthrax was virtually unknown in the United States. [Larry Bush] interviewed Stevens' wife, who said her husband opened letters all day, and concluded that the anthrax had come through the postal system. Bush said he told local health officials, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the FBI about his suspicions. Scientists knew that anthrax spores could lie dormant in soil for decades and then cause disease. They also knew that inhalation anthrax occurred when spores entered the lungs and were swept into lymph nodes in the mediastinum, in the middle of the chest, where they germinated and pumped out toxins. But scientists still had much to learn. Medical experts also misjudged the difficulty that doctors would have in diagnosing inhalation anthrax, assuming that a sophisticated surveillance system was needed to detect an attack. But Bush, the Florida infectious disease expert, said he knew immediately what was wrong with Stevens, the first patient with inhalation anthrax

Mr. [Bush] fainted after a pretzel stuck in his throat and he gagged and coughed. Dr. Richard J. Tubb, the White House physician, said pressure from the pretzel on Mr. Bush's esophagus stimulated the vagal nerve, which connects the brain and the heart and other organs. The vagal action slowed Mr. Bush's heartbeat and lowered his blood pressure, making him faint, a reaction that is called vaso-vagal syncope. Dr. Tubb said in an interview that he based the diagnosis on his examination on findings from several standard tests. Dr. Tubb said a cardiologist and neurologist who had examined Mr. Bush during an extensive medical checkup on Aug. 4, Mr. Bush's first as president, concurred in the diagnosis. Ms. [Cindy Wright] checked Mr. Bush's blood pressure, which was 111/70 and pulse, which was 51, both normal levels for him. After Ms. Wright paged him and another White House doctor, Bill Lang, at 5:48 p.m., Dr. Tubb said, he drove to the White House and found Mr. Bush ''sitting on his couch.'' Mr. Bush was wearing his reading glasses, which were twisted, but the lenses were intact

[Robert Stevens] worked in a state where no anthrax had been reported in years. Inhalation anthrax was virtually unknown in the United States. [Larry M. Bush] interviewed Stevens' wife, who said her husband opened letters all day, and concluded that the anthrax had come through the postal system. Bush said he told local health officials, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the FBI about his suspicions

The two scientists rigged a device about the size of a thin hockey puck, and on Oct. 8, 1958, Dr. [Ake Senning] cut open Mr. [Arne H. W. Larsson]'s chest to implant it. Eight hours later, the pacemaker failed. Dr. Senning then implanted the only backup, one with batteries that had to be recharged every few hours. The pacemaker worked, on and off, for three years. Subsequently, Mr. Larsson underwent 25 operations and procedures to replace pacemakers that failed for one reason or another and to receive newer devices that were smaller, smarter, safer and more durable and versatile. Implanting a pacemaker no longer requires the chest surgery that Mr. Larsson underwent

Mr. [Robert Stevens] worked in an office, in a state where no anthrax had been reported in years. And inhalation anthrax was virtually unknown in the United States; almost all of the very few cases had occurred in workers exposed to airborne spores -- by working with hides of infected animals, for example. Dr. [Larry M. Bush] interviewed Mr. Stevens's wife, who said her husband opened letters all day, and concluded that the anthrax had come through the postal system. Dr. Bush said he told local health officials, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Federal Bureau of Investigation about his suspicions. Medical textbooks say that inhalation anthrax starts with mild, flulike symptoms that are hard to recognize, and that by the time it progresses to its severe phase, it is easy to diagnose but virtually impossible to cure. But the two postal workers who came to the emergency room at Inova Fairfax in October did not have textbook symptoms. The first patient did not even seem very ill, but a CT scan of his chest showed telltale signs of anthrax. The second patient complained of the worst headache of his life. But he did not have the classic signs of inhalation anthrax -- bacteria in his spinal fluid and abnormalities in a chest scan. Doctors learned he had anthrax only when they examined his blood and saw the characteristic boxcar-shaped anthrax bacteria. Dr. Larry M. Bush diagnosed anthrax in a Florida patient in October. (Alex Quesada/Matrix, for The New York Times)(pg. 1); Dr. [Julie L. Gerberding] -- Acting deputy director, Center for Infectious Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: ''In retrospect, we were certainly not prepared for layers and levels of collaboration that would be required.'' (Alan S. Weiner for The New York Times); Dr. [D. A. Henderson] -- Director, federal Office of Public Preparedness: ''Everything we knew about the disease just did not fit with what was going on. We were totally baffled.'' (Carol T. Powers for The New York Times); Dr. [John F. Eisold] -- The Capitol physician, on the anthrax mailed to Senator [Tom Daschle]'s office: ''People thought each spore was plutonium.'' (Stephen Crowley/The New York Times)(pg. 16)

On 'Good Morning America,' Charles Gibson began a conversation with his co-anchor, Diane Sawyer, by saying: 'There's a study from the World Health Organization, this is for real, that blonds are an endangered species. Women and men with blond hair, eyebrows and blue eyes, natural blonds, they say will vanish from the face of the earth within 200 years, because it is not as strong a gene as brunets.' The British accounts were replete with the views of bleached blonds who said hairdressers would never allow blondness to become extinct, and doctors who said that rare genes would pop up to keep natural blonds from becoming an endangered species