5 ms·
I was lucky enough to be seen by MD Anderson doctors for my rare type of cancer. Within hours of the first painless infusion, the large tumors I could feel and
by leakycap 1y ago
I was lucky enough to be seen by MD Anderson doctors for my rare type of cancer. Within hours of the first painless infusion, the large tumors I could feel and see from the outside were completely gone. Hours, truly.
Now, the rest of the chemo wasn't as easy as the first. But the miracles of modern medicine, thanks to dedicated researchers and medical teams, truly blew my mind and that was a decade ago.
I was told I was one of 42 people ever that MD Anderson had seen with this cancer, yet they were able to tailor a treatment. I think Vox is right about the progress being amazing, and I hope it continues.
- wileydragonfly 1y agoI’ve met people that have moved to Houston for cancer treatment there, were given 1-2 years to live, and they’re still here 15-20 years later. It is a really remarkable place.
- yellow_lead 1y agoMD Anderson is great. The greater Houston area has too much cancer, in part caused by the many refineries and chemical factories. At least there are good treatment options nearby. https://www.propublica.org/article/toxmap-poison-in-the-air https://www.propublica.org/article/toxmap-poison-in-the-air
- looofooo0 1y agoAny statistics on this claim?
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- beerandt 1y ago'Cancer Alley' maps are generally just the same cherrypicked socioeconomic/ racial map you see everywhere- especially the refinery claims. Adjust for those factors and the increased incidence disappears.
- looofooo0 1y agoAll these things people claim in the comments section seem like not very rigorous. Also, any increase in cancer cases has to be corrected for overweight people in the US.
- Majromax 1y ago> Adjust for those factors and the increased incidence disappears. 'Adjusting' for those factors builds in the assumption that they're independent of the thing you're trying to measure. If living near a smokestack is undesirable, then poorer/marginalized people will live there even if it also causes cancer.
- timcobb 1y agoMaybe they meant race/socioeonomics, not pollution.
- EasyMark 1y agoI assume they meant if you look at roughly the same socioeconomic group that lives 500 miles from refineries as opposed to 500 meters you'll find similar numbers for cancer/other stuff. I'm not on either side of the fence because I don't know, just pointing out what was meant. I'd welcome statistics from either case.
- comte7092 1y agoThe challenge is that it’s very unlikely that race/socioeconomic factors are causal in and of themselves, the reason why you would adjust for those variables is because they are tightly correlated with other causal factors that aren’t being observed directly, e.g. poorer healthcare availability, poorer access to healthy foods, etc. Environmental pollution very reasonably can be hypothesized to be a causal mechanism behind cancer rates. Exposure to which is going to be heavily correlated with race and socioeconomics. I may be misinterpreting OP, but their statement came off as “cancer maps are just maps of where poor non white people live, so it’s not the pollution”, but you can’t just “control” for things that way. Given the fact that environmental pollution is a hazard, there’s a reason why that demographic lives there that makes the exposure to pollution not independent from the demographic characteristics of the population.
- magicalhippo 1y agoHere in Norway there had been increasing focus on the long-term consequences of working on oil rigs. There's been several studies[1] showing multiple different forms of cancer are over-represented among oil workers[2], and linked to benzene and crude oil exposure. Granted Norway's oil is exclusively offshore, so exposure might be different. But, contrary to what a former boss supposedly told his rig workers, just because oil is a natural product does imply it and its processing is harmless. [1]: https://www.fhi.no/en/cancer/studies/cancer-among-offshoreworkers/about-the-study/ https://www.fhi.no/en/cancer/studies/cancer-among-offshorewo... [2]: https://www.forskning.no/arbeidsvilkar-olje-og-gass/olje-pioneren-jan-erik-har-mistet-kolleger-til-kreft-og-ble-selv-syk-av-kjemikalier-na-oppdager-forskere-stadig-nye-kreftformer-knyttet-til-arbeid-med-olje/2413970 https://www.forskning.no/arbeidsvilkar-olje-og-gass/olje-pio...
- burnt-resistor 1y agoHouston has zillions of petrochem facilities around it that regularly blow up.
- apwell23 1y agofr 90% of cancer treatment just slash, burn or poison.
- xattt 1y agoYou mention rapid debulking following an infusion. That must have been a surreal experience. Congratulations! How does the treatment you received compare to the current standard of care? Would current therapies also result in rapid debulking as well?
- leakycap 1y agoI remember the little clear IV looked like saline and the nurse said, "Your insurance is getting billed $75,000 for this, so lay back and enjoy" - that was one of many expensive treatments, I was very lucky to have good insurance. I was told the rapid debulking was because the first infusion I got was a targeted drug that specifically found and destroyed the cancer cells. The follow up chemo was R-CHOP (Rituximab, Cyclophosphamide, Doxorubicin, Vincristine, and Prednisone), and my understanding this regimen is still being used.
- Loughla 1y agoMy dad just went through lymphoma treatment using R-CHOP in 2024. It really is like a miracle. He felt like shit for a day after treatment (actually he felt like shit for one entire day, three days after treatment because he was pumped so full of steroids). Otherwise no real side effects.
- zevets 1y agoI take four pills a day and the primary side effect is weight gain. The earlier 1950s era treatment made me exhausted 24/7. There's a new trial that has a new target, and looks to solve the remaining symptoms of the disease, with effectively no side effects The big problem is that it's a chronic blood cancer, so the pills have a list price of $180k/yr. Who knows if my insurance will cough up for a second big-money prescription/
- Xenoamorphous 1y agoOut of curiosity, when some medication causes weight gain, how does it work? Does it increase appetite? Or does it slow metabolic rate?
- dghughes 1y agoNot OP but I'd guess fluid retention.
- Loughla 1y agoUsually it's just fluid.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- kolinko 1y agoUsually, aside from water retention, it’s the appetite, I would assume. Lower metabolic rate by itself would lower the appetite because the person would feel less hungry.
- OkayPhysicist 1y agoMetabolic rate and appetite are loosely correlated at best. Most stimulants simultaneously reduce appetite, and increase metabolic rate. (in fact, that's where a significant portion of their negative side effects come from. Habitual meth users tend to become malnourished, mostly because of the appetite suppression, which combined with teeth grinding jitters, causes the iconic "meth mouth")
- dumb1224 1y agoThe common cancer treatment modalities: surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy, targeted drugs and their combinations are very effective first line treatments. I agree the statistics are much better. In the field of cancer research it has been focusing more on drug / treatment resistance, heterogeneous response to the same treatment and development of less invasive methods both in treatment and assessment (imaging and monitoring). We have made huge progress in terms of deeper understanding of cancer biology and human disease mechanism in general. However we have a very long way to understand when things progress outside of our control how to respond. E.g the key cancer drivers have been identified long ago but how biology and evolution modulate its response to external treatment has so much unknowns. That requires large effort to push the whole foundation of science to elucidate the details of these processes in my opinion.
- apwell23 1y agoThing with any cancer treatment is that it works miraculously for someone somewhere and makes it to the news all over. But it rarely translates to that level of success with masses of cancer patients.
- jghn 1y agoThat is overly reductive. Treatments are measured by metrics such as 5 year survival, 10 year survival, progression-free survival, overall survival, etc. Further, when evaluating a new treatment it will be compared against the current standard of care: does it provide better overall survival? if not, does it at least provide better progression-free survival?
- apwell23 1y agoright i wasn't talking about incremental improvements, Which there have been many. But there hasn't been a fundamental breakthrough to achieve what gp is describe for 99% of advanced cancers. > Within hours of the first painless infusion, the large tumors I could feel and see from the outside were completely gone.
- leakycap 1y agoThe breakthroughs have been happening right under your nose. For example, when they do a biopsy now you get incredible detail about the subtype of cancer/cells and details that help target treatment. I'm not the only person with this kind of story of rapid debulking, that's why someone else chimed in with the medical term. The miracle isn't my one story; the modern miracle of medicine and the fight against cancer is that my story IS one of thousands every month that leave MD Anderson (just one hospital) and have their lives literally extended. In my case, a decade so far with no more trouble, knock on wood. I think you cannot expect a blanket solution for cancer. Cancers are all extremely different. We will have thousands of breakthroughs for these myriad of cancer types.
- apwell23 1y ago
- gaoshan 1y ago>the progress being amazing, and I hope it continues. and that it does not require being lucky to receive, as you were.
- leakycap 1y agoAll things have to start somewhere. My insurance paid the extreme prices that this rare treatment required at the time, and my treatment meant they had more data (and now a decade of follow up) to verify if the treatment works. I didn't have a job with insurance because of luck, in fact I was aware enough of medical costs I chose which job I accepted based on the medical benefits. I was lucky to be alive at a time treatment was available and within reach of a modern working person, not lucky like the Queen's nephew being promoted. I think saying I was single and working my first job out of college should put it in perspective here. I didn't drive a Cadillac to my chemos. Stuff costs money, especially medical R&D, production, and care delivery.