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Swiping Out Cancer
mhackarbie writes "Just read this article over on Wired about a cheap hand scanner which might be able to spot cancer tumors. It took only few seconds of reflection before I decided this could be the killer biotech app which is needed for the dot-bio boom everyone keeps predicting someday." We've mentioned this gizmo before.
As someone who has seen, at first hand, the horrors of undetected cancer, this could just the ticket.
My Father died from cancer last year. He had a secondary tumor removed a year before, but the specialists who saw him could apparently not detect a primary. It was clear to us that there was one (he was degenerating), but current detection techniques, apparently, couldn't find it. An autopsy was conducted when he died, at which point extensive cancer was located.
Part of the cure for cancer must surely be early, and accurate, detection. Let's hope this is part of it!
The fact the thing gives off microwaves probably means that it wont be for normal consumer use. The advantage is that it can be so every doctors office can have one or more. Because of its size. But I can see some person so worried about cancer who scans themselves all the time until the microwaves give him cancer.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
I really hope this thing work really really well, but the article just danced around the issue of false negatives. Anybody have any idea how many there were in the study at hand?
This is something that interestes me. My father died of cancer at the age of 56 and my mother survived it at the age of 44. I think I might have a high hereditary risk. The idea of cheaper detection methods is important. The cheaper it is to detect, the more frequently the tests will take place. Hopefully, this could become part of a yearly checkup.
For the record, neither of my parents were smokers. I think I might know how I am going to die.
----
Squirrel
Now, it would of course be great if this actually worked, but I have to say I am very sceptical.
I find it difficult to believe that the system it uses will actually produce accurate results. The human body surely has lots of tissues in different structures and densities, and also of course there are lots of different types of cancer. Most importantly, you want to get cancers when they are small - tiny even. I find it hard to believe that this scanner could do that. If you've ever seen a small cancerous mole, for instance, you will understand.
When we're dealing with stuff like cancer, 95% (say) accuracy isn't enough. False positives result in a lot of stress for people until they have proper tests. False negatives of course have even worse consequences.
Complex problems don't have easy solutions. Cancer is complex.
Insurance companies as well.
Go to your job interview, pee in this cup, swipe this in your mouth.
In one simple step eliminate drug users, and possible insurance deadweights... Joy!
Those who subject to drug tests have nobody to blame but themselves for their proliferation to other industries like insurance. If nobody submits to a test, or a signifigant fraction of the exceptional workers refuse, a competitive advantage exists for those companies who do not test.
The process of pre-employment drug testing is rare (and, I think, illegal) in Canada, and our country has not fallen apart as a result. I have no information to assume there is any difference in levels of drug addiction between Canada and the USA.
Drug testing is easily remedied outside the courts if it truely bothers you. It seems most people are content to piss in a cup for a job. To each their own.
..don't panic
Here's a post about something a fair amount of /.ers will not be familiar with: BREASTS ;^)
;) It is apparently also a fairly inaccurate method of detecting breast-cancer, but that is another story :o Then repeat process for the other breast.
:)
;)
:o
/. )
(we're talking hands-on experience guys, looking does not count
What have (wonderful wonderful) female breasts got to do with a handheld cancer-scanner?
Well...do you know how they check women's breasts for tumors currently? No? Well...
It involved placing a single breast in a vice-like device, which is then TIGHTENED.
(And yes, the device is made out of COLD metal
(I don't have this from first-hand experience, I am not a woman
Now imagine if you could do the same with a little baton...
"I wave my magic-stick and...voila!"
(For godsake, don't take that out of context
Testicle-cancer in men is (also) often diagnosed too late. I do not know how they confirm that you have it (AFTER the physical examination) but I hope to god it does not involve a vice-like device
Again, bring on the handheld scanner...
BTW some poster mentioned that micro-wave radiation is dangerous...nope, not as far as I can establish...(read up on the HERF gun previously mentioned on
I agree, and not just for cancer. I live in Canada and though health care is virtually free, not being able to 'buy the best advice' leaves me doubting every diagnosis, and in many cases rightfully so.
This type of device, if extended for other types of detection, could be exactly what 'Dr. Dad' needs to ensure the family is in general good heath without having to rely on the shady advice of under skilled or under paid health care staff.
I'm wrong and so are you.
"dot-bio boom"?! There's an over-simplified buzzword raped straight from CNN.
_nfotxn
The article opens with comments about "40 minute MRI and CAT scans", and "the narrow tube of the MRI scanner". It proceeds to state that an MRI costs "$1000 of the patient's money". While the first two were maybe true a decade ago, the days of even a 20 minute MRI scan are long gone. The medical imaging business is half about diagnostic quality, and half about patient throughput.
By speeding up the scans as they've been doing since day one, they get more patients through during a day, allowing the scanners to be more profitable, and for the costs to go down. The $3,000,000 figure is awfully high for even a high-end MRI scanner these days.
This might very well be an interesting, promising device. But, making it look as if it's really good, by presenting deceptive information about the current options, is a huge red flag as far as I'm concerned.
If it's really a useful device, present it as it is - don't lie about the other technologies. If it's that superior, the marketplace will find it and respond accordingly.
The case of "MRIs on demand" shows the problem of ambiguous medical tests. There are firms all around the country that will perform and interpret a thorac MRI for as little as $500. Typically they find find dozens of "anomalies", that are probably harmless. However, it may cost thousands to track these down, including in some cases biopsies. Especially since the people who voluntarily solicit these MRIs are worry-worts in the first place. Medical economists suggest that test with lots of false-positives are economically counterproductive in an already expensive medical system.
Look up the economics term "externality." Whether you do or do not submit to a drug test does not directly have an impact on whether companies test--it only directly affects whether you get the job or not. Yes if enough other people refuse at some point companies would stop doing it but each individual has to make the decision for themselves first & others second. It's easy to be flippant about this but in an terrible job market, if the question is whether to pee in a cup & feed one's family or protest on principle and go hungry the decision is pretty obvious. And at least in American, many of the jobs that require drug testing are in manufacturing which tend to employ people who have few other options.
Vote Quimby.
Problem with dogs that are trained to sniff anything, be it drugs, bombs or cancer vs some man made technology is the inconsistency between dogs and dog trainers. Although, they may be more sensitive than any man-made device, they also have bad days and can get sick without their handlers noticing. Better to have a device that while not necesarily more reliable or sensitive, might be more easily tested for variations in performance. In other words, are dogs really going to be accurately tested every day to make sure their performance isn't slipping? But maybe a device can be tested more easily and regularly to ensure quality.
So, why are dogs so heavily relied upon at airports and for other security. Because simply put, security doesn't need to be 100%, it is largely the deterrent that the dogs provide that provides the actual security. Knowing that these dogs are being used will deter the less serious drug smugler or terrorist from the attempt. But with something like cancer screaning you really have to have a high degree of certainty and invariability in order for it to be useful.
So the reason dogs wouldn't be used is that they just add to the cost of diagnosis, but can't rule out cancer to a high enough degree, making additional more invasive diagnostic procedures needed anyway.
If this electronic device can be 99.9% accurate at determining that a person doesn't have cancer when used properly, then you can then focus resources on those remaining. Which is better for those that are shown to be clear of cancer. But it also changes the economics for those devices that require greater capital expenditures, they are only economical when used on larger numbers of people, but if this screaning reduces those numbers of false positives, then a fewer number of truly sick people will be left paying for the more expensive machines. So either the number of expensive diagnostic machines will need to be reduced, the price will have to come down, or the cancer sick individuals will be charged more money.
Different forms of medical devices have different requirements for precision---that's the percent of things they report that are correct---and recall---that's the percent of things they are supposed to find, that they do find. Before this could replace an MRI as a primary diagnostic tool, it would need to have 100% recall. Precision is less important, because if you do get a false positive, you can go in for further testing (which is not to diminish the stress and fear induced by false positives).
In the article the experts comment that it can't replace MRIs yet with the reported accuracy rate, which is true. What it *can* do is become a routine part of a physical. Once the wand is bought, it sounds like using it is essentially free (well, they have to occasionally replace the batteries!), so there's no reason not to just use it all over the place. And what *that* does is make it more likely that we'll detect tumours early, before we would have any reason to suspect a problem otherwise.
On the problem of false positives, btw---a lot of that can be mitigated by a good doctor. When a false positive is possible, the doctor needs to explain that, exaggerating its possibility, to reduce the stress in the meantime. My mom went through that once; it turned out that she was just unusually athletic and the more muscular tissue set off the sensor! But those three days sucked. Had the doctor said, "look, this is probably nothing, we just need to run another test", it's not nearly as bad.
``This, too, shall pass.'' ---Eastern proverb