CONFIRMATION OF ABNORMAL SERIAL SCANS

Often women who have a consistently abnormal thermal scan are resistant to getting a mammogram when a structural test is needed. For whatever reason - be it the physician, the radiologist or the insurance company - getting an Ultrasound as the next step it usually difficult or impossible. Ideally an Ultrasound could be performed on the breast or the area of concern noted by the infrared exam. When the technician switches the imaging mode to Doppler - in order to analyze the blood flow during the exam - it helps to identify the suspicious blood flow detected by the thermogram. Doppler can determine if the circulation is consistent with normal blood vessels (by directional flow or the pulse due to heart beat) or if the flow is chaotic and abnormal, indicating a potential change in normal circulation.

The thermogram identifies changes in metabolism and the resulting change in circulation. A structural test is needed to determine if an abnormal growth is already present - or if thermography is detecting a metabolic change in advance of the structural tissue change. This is one reason that thermography and mammography act together to increase the efficacy of early detection. A serial positive thermogram with a negative mammogram warrants close observation. MRI with and without contrast is currently the ideal test to identify the neoangiogenesis associated with breast cancers. But again, the roadblock is in place to prohibit MRI unless a significant family history is present or the patient has a history of multiple biopsies and abnormal mammograms with negative biopsies. Cost of this test is one reason that insurance companies usually withhold precertification when it is requested. Even if a patient wanted to self-pay for the test it is withheld.

For these reasons – I’ve been encouraging women with repeatedly abnormal thermal scans to consider another option for early detection. This option is not medical imaging, but the detection of very significant protein markers found in the Cancer Profile exam (blood and urine analysis) conducted by American Metabolic Laboratory of Hollywood Florida. This very sensitive test can identify multiple markers – that when elevated indicate the presence of cancer in the body. Having consistently abnormal thermal scans and abnormal cancer markers help the women determine how aggressive she must be in seeking medical intervention. Additionally – with negative cancer markers – the abnormal thermogram can be followed and diet and lifestyle can be altered to change hormone influence on the breasts (although this is usually the first step following abnormal thermal scans.)

Dr. Emil Schandl, Ph.D. of AML has developed and structured this analysis (Cancer Profile Plus) to find the human growth hormones associated with early cancer and other proteins and enzymes, including serum thymidine kinase – which aid in the replication of cancer cells and the metastasis of the cells to distance sites. This test is highly accurate and detects cancer in the earliest stages – usually before structural imaging detects the multiplication of abnormal cells into a tumor. Mammograms detect cancer when the cells have sufficient doubling to measure at least 200 cells. The Cancer Profile needs only 4-6 doublings (about 12-16 cells) for cells to emit enough metabolic enzymes (MMPs) for detection.

For anyone facing cancer concern via thermography or not the Cancer Profile Plus is your next step. www.americanmetaboliclaboratories.net

This article was in my Oncology Newsletter today.  This is VERY IMPORTANT INFORMATION for anyone interested in Infrared Imaging for breast health monitoring. Please read this article and keep in mind that IR detects this fine vascular network that provides the opportunity for breast cancer to metastasize.

June 17, 2013

How dormant breast cancer tumor cells become metastatic

The long-standing mystery about what activates dormant disseminated breast cancer tumor cells after years and even decades of latency may have been solved. Dormant cancer cells have been found to reside in the microenvironment surrounding microvasculature, which are the small blood vessels that transport blood within tissues. When these blood vessels begin to sprout, the new tips produce molecules that transform dormant cancer cells into metastatic tumors.
In a small but significant number of breast cancer patients, cancerous cells can move through the bloodstream from breast tissue to secondary sites in other parts of the body. There, they may remain in a dormant state that is clinically undetected for an extended period of time before they suddenly become metastatic. It has been difficult if not impossible to predict if and when metastases will occur.
“Our study reveals that a stable microvasculature constitutes a dormant niche, whereas a sprouting neovasculature sparks micrometastatic outgrowth,” said cell biologist and lead investigator Mina Bissell, PhD, of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California. “Sprouting is meant to coincide with tissue growth, but if a tumor cell happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, then it comes under the influence of the factors deposited by tip cells and it starts growing.”
“Some patients may experience metastatic relapse within months, other patients may go several years or even decades without distant recurrence,” Bissell says. “The recent discovery of tumor-promoting milieus, referred to as metastatic niches, that are established at distant sites prior to or upon the arrival of disseminated tumor cells could explain cancer cells that relapse early, but in late relapsing populations, what tumor cells do from the time of dissemination to the time they become clinically detectable has been a big question.”
The research team discovered that the protein thrombospondin-1, which is prevalent in stable microvasculature, creates a dormant niche by suppressing the growth of breast cancer cells. When the tips of blood cells begin to sprout, the thrombospondin-1 proteins give way to tumor necrosis factor-beta 1 and periostin proteins in the neovasculature. This turns it into a metastatic niche that both permits and accelerates the growth of breast cancer cells.
The identification of dormant niches in basement membrane microvasculature and how those niches become metastatic in the neovasculature holds important implications for future breast cancer therapies. These research findings, published in Nature Cell Biology (2013; doi:10.1038/ncb2767), will support future models that will allow therapies to be screened that impact tumor dormancy and metastasis.

From news release at ChemotherapyAdvisor.com [info@email.chemotherapyadvisor.com]

Six-Month Intervals for Post-Lumpectomy Mammography Do Not Improve Detection Rates for Breast Cancer Recurrence

(ChemotherapyAdvisor) – Scheduling follow-up mammography every 6 months after breast-conserving treatment (BCT) offers little benefit over a schedule of annual follow-up mammography for breast cancer survivors, according to a retrospective single-institution study published in the Journal of Surgical Oncology.
“Mammography yield of cancer in the study population was not greater than the general population,” and there was “no difference” in tumor recurrence detection rates among patients complying with 6-month follow-up recommendations, reported senior author David McNaul, MD, of the University of Missouri's Department of Radiology in Columbia, MO, and coauthors.
The authors studied medical records of 399 patients who underwent BCT lumpectomies between 1997 and 2009, and who were followed for 2 years after surgery. Cancer yields from follow-up unilateral mammography were compiled and two comparisons were made: First, BCT patients' mammography-detected tumor recurrence was compared to mammography cancer yields in the general screening population. Second, yields were compared between BCT patients who were compliant or noncompliant with instructions to undergo follow-up mammography every 6 months for 2 years.
Yields were similar in both the BCT follow-up population and the general screening population and the study found “no difference between the compliant and noncompliant groups regarding tumor recurrence,” the authors reported. In the group of 67 noncompliant patients, no local tumor recurrences were identified.
Among the 399 patients instructed to undergo follow-up mammography every 6 months instead of annually after BCT, the authors noted, “the extra interval unilateral mammograms (at 6 and 18 months) only detected one local recurrence. Based on the 6-month surveillance mammography schedule, a large number of additional mammograms were performed without obvious benefit.”
“Mammography yield was 0.94 and 2.87 per 1,000 (95% CI: 0.0-0.0028) for the first and second years, respectively, following surgery,” they noted.
The study's findings are consistent with ASCO's guidelines, which recommend annual mammography after BCT, rather than the every-6-months follow-up mammography recommendations observed at some cancer centers like their own, the authors concluded.
Abstract