Celebrity Chefs Duel It Out To Help Rekindle Cancer Patients’ Pleasure In Food
Cancer treatment can destroy a patient's enjoyment of food, which can be dangerous if it causes them to stop eating entirely. Now doctors are teaming up with chefs to try to combat that side effect. In other news, women are getting unnecessary mastectomies at troubling rates and a body-builder chronicles her struggle with ovarian cancer.
Stat:
A Cook-Off Seeks To Awaken Cancer Patients' Ruined Sense Of Taste
But behind the foodie fun is hard science and a real clinical conundrum. Killing cancer cells means killing healthy cells along with them. The poisons of chemo and the waves of radiation are especially good at taking apart the DNA of fast-dividing cells. That can help stop the out-of-control expansion of tumors. But the nerve cells in the nose and mouth replenish themselves quickly, and so they die, too. The resulting changes in taste and smell might seem like a small price to pay for a lifesaving treatment. Yet one’s desire to get up in the morning can be intimately connected to one’s ability to enjoy food. Lose your ability to taste properly and your mental and physical health — which, for cancer patients, is already fragile — can suffer even more. (Boodman, 12/21)
Los Angeles Times:
17% Of Women With Early-Stage Breast Cancer Have Unnecessary Mastectomies, And Doctors Want To Know Why
What happens when doctors encourage patients to decide for themselves what kind of cancer treatment they should receive — and then the patients make the wrong choice? That is the dilemma facing a growing number of surgeons who care for women with early-stage breast cancer, new research suggests. (Kaplan, 12/21)
The Washington Post:
A 23-Year-Old Bodybuilder Is Being Ravaged By Ovarian Cancer — And Instagramming It All
Three weeks before her wedding day, Cheyann Shaw uploaded a video to YouTube, a space the fitness fanatic regularly filled with workout clips and health tips. But this time was different: She was now using the social video platform for a more emotional and profound purpose. “I’m going to cry,” she said in the video, “but — I was told that I have cancer.” (Bever, 12/21)
