(Press-News.org) HOUSTON – Children of melanoma survivors were more likely to wear hats and re-apply sunscreen after receiving a multi-media informational program designed specifically for them. These new findings were included in research published in the journal of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention – a publication of the American Association for Cancer Research.
A team of researchers led by Ellen R. Gritz, Ph.D., and Mary Tripp, Ph.D., M.P.H., both researchers of Behavioral Science at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, conducted a randomized trial to determine if a sun protection program for melanoma survivors and their children was more effective than standard educational materials available to the general public.
"This country is expecting more than 76,000 new cases of melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer, to be diagnosed this year," said Tripp. "Similar to tobacco education, sun protection education is also critical, especially in the early stages of life."
The researchers sought to determine whether a sun protection intervention would impact melanoma survivors' attitudes and beliefs related to their children's sun protection, decrease children's sunburns and increase children's sun protection. More than 2,000 potential candidates from the MD Anderson patient registry were screened for study eligibility with 340 melanoma survivors – with age appropriate children – participating in the trial.
"This study is the first to examine a sun protection intervention for children of melanoma survivors," said Gritz, who is also the chair of Behavioral Science at MD Anderson. "This is significant in that the risk for children of melanoma survivors is almost doubled because of possible shared genotypic and phenotypic factors." Genetic factors are inherited traits including fair skin or light eye color, whereas phenotypic factors involve behavioral and development traits.
The study randomized melanoma survivors into two groups: one receiving standard educational materials consisting of health-related brochures on sun protection, physical activity and nutrition, and one receiving the sun protection intervention. This group received print booklets and a DVD featuring melanoma survivors. Materials presented survivors' personal stories and motivations for protecting their children from the sun, and showed how survivors and their families practice sun protection.
Melanoma survivors completed telephone interviews at baseline and at one month and four months after intervention.
Overall, the intervention increased sunscreen reapplication and the use of wide-brimmed hats in the children. "This is an important finding because children typically use less sunscreen than is recommended and reapplication improves sun protection," said Tripp. The results indicated the greatest effect on sunscreen behavior was in survivors who had children younger than 8 years old. Tripp also noted that few interventions directed to parents have increased children's protective hat-wearing behavior.
"This study provides a valuable starting point for future research needed to develop interventions to increase sun protection in children who are at a higher risk for developing melanoma," said Tripp.
INFORMATION:
Other MD Anderson researchers contributing to this study include Susan Peterson, Ph.D. and Alexander Prokhorov, M.D., Ph.D., both of Behavioral Science; Sanjay Shete, Ph.D., Diana Urbauer and Bryan Fellman of Biostatistics; Jeffrey Lee, M.D. and Jeffrey Gershenwald, M.D., of Surgical Oncology.
This research was funded by a grant from the American Cancer Society and supported by the National Cancer Institute (P30CA016672).
END
WASHINGTON, D.C. Oct. 4, 2013 -- Researchers in Japan have developed a new photodiode that can detect in just milliseconds a certain type of high-energy ultraviolet light, called UVC, which is powerful enough to break the bonds of DNA and harm living creatures. The researchers describe their new device in the journal Applied Physics Letters.
Although this radiation doesn't normally reach the Earth's surface, it can leak through to just below the hole in the ozone layer. Monitoring this radiation is a way of tracking the hole in the ozone layer, and photodiodes that measure ...
University of Notre Dame researchers Shahriar Mobashery and Mayland Chang and their collaborators in Spain have published research results this week that show how methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) regulates the critical crosslinking of its cell wall in the face of beta-lactam antibiotics.
The work, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveals the mechanistic basis for how the MRSA bacterium became such a difficult pathogen over the previous 50 years, in which time it spread rapidly across the world. Modern strains of MRSA ...
Understanding how genes act in specific tissues is critical to our ability to combat many human diseases, from heart disease to kidney failure to cancer. Yet isolating individual cell types for study is impossible for most human tissues.
A new method developed by researchers at Princeton University and the University of Michigan called "in silico nano-dissection" uses computers rather than scalpels to separate and identify genes from specific cell types, enabling the systematic study of genes involved in diseases.
The team used the new method to successfully identify ...
Philadelphia, Pa. (October 4, 2013) – Doctors who abuse prescription drugs often do so for "self-medication"—whether for physical or emotional pain or stress relief, reports a study in the October Journal of Addiction Medicine, the official journal of the American Society of Addiction Medicine. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.
Based on focus groups with physicians in treatment for substance abuse, the findings lend "unique insights" into the reasons why doctors abuse prescription medications—as well as important ...
NASA's footage of the first moon landing promised a future of sci-fi heroism that never came to pass, according to a new study.
The paper, by Professor Steve Brown and Professor Martin Parker, of the University of Leicester's School of Management, and Dr Lewis Goodings, of the University of Roehampton, is published in the International Journal of Management Concepts and Philosophy.
The first moon landing is overwhelmingly remembered as an exciting and important turning point in world history, which continues to inspire space exploration projects to Mars and beyond today.
However, ...
SAN FRANCISCO – Swallowing pills containing a concentrate of fecal bacteria successfully stops recurrent bouts of debilitating Clostridium difficile (C. diff) infection by rebalancing the bacteria in the gut, suggests a study being presented at the IDWeek 2013™ meeting today.
Infection from C. diff bacteria is such a concern that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) named it one of the three most urgent threats in its recent landmark report on antibiotic resistance. C. diff sickens half a million Americans and kills 14,000 every year. C. diff infection ...
SAN FRANCISCO – A vast majority of people who see their doctors for sore throats or acute bronchitis receive antibiotics, yet only a small percentage should, according to analyses of two major national surveys being presented at IDWeek 2013™. Those illnesses usually are caused by viruses, and antibiotics – which only treat bacterial infections – do not help.
Harvard University researchers analyzed the National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey and National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey and determined that doctors prescribed antibiotics in 60 percent of visits ...
SAN FRANCISCO – When patients with HIV are hospitalized for other conditions, such as a heart problem, surgery or complications of diabetes, mistakes are often made involving their complicated anti-retroviral therapy (ART) regimens. But those errors are more than twice as likely to be corrected when patients are seen by an infectious diseases (ID) physician, suggests a Cleveland Clinic study being presented at IDWeek 2013™ today.
Most patients with HIV are cared for by physicians with HIV expertise in the community, and when they are hospitalized for non-HIV conditions, ...
VIDEO:
In this video, scientists demonstrate how to deliver drugs to the mammary gland via nipple-injection.
Click here for more information.
On October 4, JoVE, the Journal of Visualized Experiments, will publish a new technique for breast cancer treatment and prevention—injection of therapeutics via the nipple. The procedure, demonstrated on mice, offers direct access to the most common origin of breast cancer, the milk ducts, and could be used to offer cancer therapy ...
Portland, Ore., USA (October 4, 2013) --- Being overweight shortens a dog's life expectancy according to new research by the WALTHAM® Centre for Pet Nutrition. Data on a range of popular dog breeds from across the USA showed that dogs that are overweight in middle age have a shorter life expectancy than ideal weight dogs. Specifically, overweight dogs were found to suffer a reduction in life expectancy of up to ten months compared to ideal weight dogs. Being overweight in middle age can have potentially far-reaching consequences for a dog's life span, highlighting the importance ...
