Category: Uncategorized

Yesterday, we wrote about new lung cancer screening guidelines and the overarching health benefits of smoking cessation.  In a strange twist, there is news today out of Washington state that uninsured Washingtonians will now have their access to the state’s Tobacco Quitline drastically cut. Quitlines (1-800-QUIT-NOW) offer valuable resources to smokers who want to quit […]

Yesterday, the US Preventive Services Task Force released a draft report recommending that older heavy smokers be screened annually for lung cancer using low-dose CT scans.  These guidelines – which closely reflect recommendations released by the American Cancer Society in January and which we wrote about here – mark a major shift in views on screening […]

One thing is clear about New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, he doesn’t shy away from a good fight, especially if the health and well-being of citizens is at stake.  Whether it’s getting food establishments to post calorie counts, cut back on trans fats, or limit the size of sugary sodas, he and his administration […]

More than 15 yeas ago we showed conclusive evidence that obesity causes many chronic conditions in the US population1-3 -, that weight gain increases risk of diabetes 4-6, heart disease 7, breast cancer 8, and that this burden adds up quickly, even before we get to overweight, let alone obesity. In the New England Journal […]

Adding to the growing benefits linked to the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine that protects against cervical cancer, is a new study providing solid evidence that the vaccine will also likely help protect youth and young adults from developing throat cancers later in life. The study appeared in the journal PLoS One and was also written up in today’s New […]

Participation in therapeutic clinical trials rarely reflects the race and ethnic composition of the patient population. To meet National Institutes of Health-mandated goals, strategies to increase participation are required. We recently reported our work from Siteman Cancer Center and the Program for the Elimination of CancerDisparities to increase trial participation. Clinical trials are crucial to […]

Click to read Dr. Goodman’s op/ed in the St. Louis American. 

As we have noted previously, colorectal cancer is a leading preventable cause of cancer mortality. See related posts. Screening can be effective reducing deaths by half. Yet it is underutilized. Multi-level interventions addressing system changes and individual factors can effectively increasing screening. To date, most interventions have been implemented and evaluated in higher-resource settings such […]

A new report by our CNiC team summarizes the rapid changes in colorectal cancer screening in Massachusetts and more broadly through New England over 15 years from 1997 onwards. The move from scientific evidence to public health strategy hinged on a sustained strategy described by the collective impact approach where common goals, a shared measurement […]

We have previously pointed to the strong evidence that use of selective estrogen receptor modulators (SERMs) substantially reduces risk of breast cancer. New updated data has been published in the British journal Lancet (May 25, 2013). The original data from all patients in a number of trials of these agents for prevention for breast cancer […]

A study published last month in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) showing that people regularly underestimate the amount of calories contained in fast food meals garnered a good deal of media attention (paper) and remains a “most read” listing on the BMJ.com site.  With good reason.  While moves are being made to prominently list the calorie […]

A study published last month in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) showing that people regularly underestimate the amount of calories contained in fast food meals garnered a good deal of media attention (paper) and remains a “most read” listing on the BMJ.com site.  With good reason.  While moves are being made to prominently list the calorie […]

Tracking the health news over the past few months, there’s been one very intriguing trend that has stood out to us here at CNiC:  Grand Visions.   Two examples of this that have huge implications for health are the push for eliminating extreme global poverty by 2030 and very serious discussions about moving toward an […]

In a time when school budgets are stressed and school performance is judged more and more on standardized test scores, it’s understandable that certain aspects of the school day that can seem less-critical get cut back or cut out altogether.  Student physical activity and physical education has been one of those things slowly reduced over the […]

As we wrote about earlier this spring, the new “TIPS from a former smoker” campaign from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is gaining a lot of attention for its no-holds-barred effort to shock non-smokers into staying smoke-free and smokers into to quitting smoking – hopefully for good.   One primary thrust of […]

Ross Brownson, PhD, Brown School of Public Health faculty with a secondary appointment in the Division of Public Health Sciences, was recently featured in  The Record in an article called “From the mountains to Missouri, Brownson is an expert in chronic disease prevention.” 

Read more about the Photovoice project here.

In a recent post about our newest addition to the 8IGHT WAYS® series (8IGHT WAYS to Prevent Colon Cancer), we also highlighted the latest cancer awareness campaign coming out of the Siteman Cancer Center featuring St. Louis Cardinals player Matt Holliday and his mom, who was recently diagnosed with, and treated, for colon cancer.  The “Cancer […]

Australia is leading the world having implemented aggressive laws limiting tobacco advertising and packaging of cigarettes. These are reportedly some of the toughest restrictions to date. Publicly accessible images show the impact of the limited marketing. The Australian Department of Health and Aging web site shows package labels. Among the key elements of tobacco control […]

http://tinyurl.com/8WaysColon As part of the Siteman Cancer Center’s new colon cancer awareness campaign featuring St. Louis Cardinals player Matt Holliday and his mom who was recently diagnosed with the disease, we’ve just released the latest in the 8IGHT WAYS series:  8IGHT WAYS to Prevent Colon Cancer. The “Cancer Doesn’t Take a Holliday” campaign tells the compelling […]

A disturbing – but unfortunately unsurprising – story last week in the New York Times details the Wild West approach many online organizations take with people’s personal  health information. With flimsy or no consent, data brokers profile individuals based on web searches and other online activities and sell this information to groups interested in using […]

The United States Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recently came out with a new draft statement on the use of medications that can reduce the risk of breast cancer in women at high-risk of the disease (draft statement). The statement recommends that women at high risk of breast cancer – and low risk for medication side […]

www.yourdiseaserisk.wustl.edu Our award-winning risk assessment site – Your Disease Risk – launched this week with some key scientific and content updates.  In addition to select risk factor modifications driven by a content review by our scientific advisory panel, we added a new assessment for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which estimates the risk of chronic […]

The New York Times recently reported on “Gruesome advertising” (http://nyti.ms/12VLyJI) that the CDC campaign against tobacco is launching to bring more graphic advertising to media-based messaging. This set of messages will increase smoking cessation. Evidence from Australia shows a spike in calls to quit lines coinciding with eh introduction of graphic messaging. Every call to […]

Can preteen kids tan indoors?  The surprising answer in Missouri is most often “yes,” found a new study that surveyed indoor tanning facilities in the state (study; media release).  This infographic highlights that and other disturbing findings that paint an unattractive picture in one of 17 states nationwide that don’t regulate the practice of indoor […]

A little while back we developed a brief card focusing on the importance of early life exposures in determining breast cancer risk.  With this week marked by a new NIH report pushing for greater emphasis on breast cancer prevention (report) and the launch of our newest 8 Ways brochure, 8IGHT WAYS to Prevent Breast Cancer […]

Prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing for prostate cancer has long resided in a medical gray area.  It is a simple and quick blood test for a very common cancer, which accounts in large part for its steadfast popularity with doctors, health fairs, and the public.  But its benefits have been demonstrated to be ambiguous – so […]

As part of the launch of our new brochure 8IGHT WAYS to Prevent Breast Cancer, we’ve also posted an online version with more details on the science and causal mechanisms behind each “way.” Still written in accessible language the “+plus” version simply provides more information for professionals and the public alike who want to delve […]

A new report from NIH’s National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences emphasizes the importance of cross-discipinary efforts to prevent breast cancer (report). As a complement to the findings of the report – Breast Cancer and the Environment: Prioritizing Prevention – we’re excited to launch our latest publication in our 8IGHT WAYS series:  8IGHT WAYS to […]

In a recent analysis of updated data from the National Health Interview Survey, Dr. Erika Walters and colleagues report on the use of Tamoxifen and Raloxifene by US women (see report) 1,2. These two selective estrogen receptor modulators bind estrogen receptors in breast tissue and reduce the action of estrogen on breast cells. Randomized controlled trials […]

With the use of the the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine gaining in popularity, the direct link between HPV infection and cervical cancer is gaining a much broader public understanding.  What’s less well known to people, though, is that HPV is linked to more cancers than just cervical cancer.  As detailed in a new article in the […]

The new two minute Coca Cola video (“Coming Together”)  touting the company’s efforts to combat weight gain while urging everyone to “come together” to work against the rising tide of obesity is at once daring and laughable.  There is a great deal to critique in the well-produced ad (seeking praise for developing new artificial sweeteners, for one), […]

Again last week we had updated data reported in the New England Journal of Medicine showing more that half of deaths among smokers are due to smoking related diseases that are in fact caused by smoking. These cancer heart disease and vascular conditions could be avoided by stopping smoking. Life expectancy is substantially reduced among […]

A new study by the American Cancer Society (ACS) finds that putting on the walking shoes and staying off the couch can extend the lives of colon cancer survivors.  The findings reinforce the latest recommendations from the American College of Sports Medicine that cancer patients should – whenever possible – be regularly active as well as […]

Dr. Kate Wolin appeared on The Dr. Oz Show to talk about research-proven ways to lower your risk of ovarian cancer. Watch all three parts of the video here.

A Bumpy Start On March 26, 2008, an article in the New York Times placed a promising test for lung cancer on shaky ground. The piece detailed that tobacco company money had paid for a 2006 groundbreaking study of the test, the results of which found that screening with low-dose computed tomography (CT) scans could […]

Photo courtesy of bardgabbard  Adding even more weight to the evidence that sugary drinks play an important role in weight is a new analysis showing that even short term increases in soda intake can lead to weight gain.  In the analysis, which appears online in the British Medical Journal, researchers from New Zealand combined the results from […]

A recent article in MedPage Today highlighted the birth of a new tanning salon industry-sponsored group that has the sole intent of refuting well-established and peer-reviewed science showing the dangers of tanning bed use. The new group – the American Suntanning Association (ASA) – which, intentionally or not, seemed to receive cozy treatment in the article, has […]

“Glycemic index.”  It’s a term that likely rings a bell, but unless you’re a dietician or research scientist, you can certainly be excused for not knowing exactly what it is and why it’s even important.  But, like a lot of similar concepts, it’s really not that complicated once you look into it a little bit. […]

The Christmas issue of the British Medical Journal (BMJ) is always high in entertainment value, containing as it does a number of off-kilter papers that still manage to inform.  The 2012 issue is marked by papers like, Why Rudolph’s nose is red and The tooth fairy and malpractice.  One of the more straightforward pieces, which still managed […]

The American Heart Association (AHA) just released its top 10 list of research accomplishments for 2012.  Most are quite heart-specific (unsurprisingly), but two of the ten highlight something we’ve often highlighted on this blog and in our risk assessment app and websites: that major chronic diseases share many of the same risk factors. “6. Why […]

A report last month in the American Cancer Society’s journal CA detailed the rates of cancer-related risk factors in US Hispanics/Latinos (report), and one of the parts of the report that stood out to us were the rates of certain behaviors in adolescents that could have implications for cancer risk later in life. As we’ve […]

Ross C. Brownson, PhD, professor of medicine and of social work at Washington University in St. Louis, has been named president-elect of the American College of Epidemiology. See Washington University School of Medicine press release.

Maybe it’s the devotion it garners; or that it can cause the jitters; or simply that so many people enjoy it so much.  But for a very long time, coffee’s been assumed to be on the healthy lifestyle black list.  And even as more and more evidence comes out that it has very few, if […]

The answer’s “No,” but here’s why it can seem that way In the early 80’s, the singer/songwriter Joe Jackson captured in the refrain of his song “Cancer” a frustrated sentiment many people were feeling back then – and not surprisingly still do now – that: “Everything gives you cancer.” Even in the 80’s – at the cusp of […]

Earlier this week, the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) published their 2012 annual report on key clinical advances in cancer. Though the document’s largely focussed on breakthroughs in treatment and diagnosis, it does highlight three important results in prevention and screening. Colon Cancer ScreeningFirst are findings from the Prostate, Lung, Colorectal, and Ovarian Cancer (PLCO) […]

Yesterday, we wrote a post about the growing use of stand-up desks as a way to cut down on the amount of time workers sit throughout the day.   That an everyday item, like a desk, could help affect a key health behavior, made the trend a good example of how important our environment (those […]

It’s been a big week for liver cancer prevention – not something we often get a chance to write here at CNiC.   As we reported on Tuesday, the US Preventive Services Task Force released new draft screening recommendations for the hepatitis C virus (HCV) – an infection that can greatly increase the risk of liver […]

Update: Final published recommendation: The USPSTF recommends screening for hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection in persons at high risk for infection. The USPSTF also recommends offering 1-time screening for HCV infection to adults born between 1945 and 1965. (Grade: B) It seems it’s time to add one more item to the list of effective screening tests […]

Going through cancer diagnosis and treatment is a draining experience – both physically and mentally – so it’s only natural that many survivors may want to just take a load off and not expend too much extra energy during their days.  Yet, a new report out of the Cochrane Collaboration suggests survivors may be denying […]