2011-02-08

Immunology = Done.

Today I finished my Immunology class that started in September 2010. What a great class; I'm a little sad it is over. I learned so much about vaccination, breast feeding, getting sick, asthma, AIDS, cancer treatments, and autoimmunity (to name name a few). This semester has been particularly interesting; since January we've covered the following topics: Allergies, Immunological Memory, Immunodeficiency Diseases, the "Hygiene Hypothesis", Vaccines, Cancer, and Autoimmune Diseases.

Cool topics, huh?

The last lecture of the course was devoted to cancer. Here are some notes:

- Cancer is essentially a failure of immunity.
- Cancer cells do not produce inflammation in the body, and without inflammation, the immune system can not respond effectively. Without inflammation, an adaptive immune response can not be activated.
- In some types of cancer, a bacterial infection is injected into the cancer-affected organ. The idea behind this treatment is that when the immune system notices the infection, it will notice the cancer and attack/destroy it too.
- If a tumor grows to one centimeter in size, the tumor can no longer self-sustain itself, thus it moves (i.e. metastasizes) somewhere new in the body.
- Cancer is more commonly seen in older people because it takes a long time for cancer cells to accumulate to the point of causing pain or illness, or to the point of being noticeable.
- Some cancers are caused by viruses (e.g. the hepatitis virus can cause liver cancer).

4 comments:

  1. In recent years people have remarked on the observed ineffectiveness of antibiotics associated with their overuse. Makes one wonder if the increase in cancers is associated with the same cause. (re: using bacterial infection to treat some types of cancer.)

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  2. What is the smallest size of tumor we can reliably detect? (and what would be the detection technique? X-rays?)

    What is the maximum growth rate of a tumor?

    If we have the answers to both of these questions, and I think we do, we should be able to come up with a check-up schedule that would catch all tumors before metastasis.

    Besides maybe the cost of scans, why are we not doing this yet?!

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  3. If you feel a tumor, it has likely already metastasizes.

    Max growth rate of tumor depends on tumor type.

    Yes, it would be good for everyone to be tested regularly for cancer!

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