Bacteria and Colon Cancer

https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2020/07/22/bacteria-and-colon-cancer

by aazaa • 6 years ago

85 29 6 years ago

blogs.sciencemag.org

bitdotdash• 6 years ago

Nice forward progress on the search for a preventative treatment. Also TIL bad gum health can lead to colon cancer. So counter intuitive. runs off to brush teeth

mgr86• 6 years ago

anecdotally one of the few things I remember about my maternal grandmother was that she implored us to take care of our teeth, and that she died of colon cancer :(

Wonder if she was on to something?

lazyjones• 6 years ago

It's not far-fetched to say that if you have bad teeth, you will chew worse and your digestion might suffer as a consequence.

pstuart• 6 years ago

And floss too!

majkinetor5• 6 years ago

Brushing and flossing does also damage your gums depending on the force and utility. Thats worst then doing nothing because now bacteria can enter your blood stream and hitch a ride to the other parts of the body.

Much better option is to not eat carbs which universally damage teath.

ssijak2• 6 years ago

Yeah sure, carbs are the ultimate devil in todays hipster keto obsessed world. There is just a slight problem that in short they were never a problem during our history when you eat unprocessed whole foods.

leviathant• 6 years ago

I think things are more complex than "brushing and flossing damages your gums depending on force and utility" because I've got wisdom teeth that I've been forcibly brushing for decades in the interest of making my gumline recede and it just. doesn't. work.

I also eat carbs like they're going out of style. At least one serving every day, minimum. I've also had an insatiable sweet tooth for most of my life, although that tapered off into my mid-30s.

I went fourteen years without seeing a dentist, and when I finally went in, aside from serious plaque buildup, my teeth and gums were in fantastic shape. It may have something to do with the fact that I drink skim milk like a toddler - about two gallons a week.

I will say, one effect that dairy and carbs has on my oral hygiene is that they promote the formation of tonsililoths - but once I was turned on to using a tongue scraper, that problem disappeared completely.

How did I go 14 years without a dentist and end up with great teeth anyway? Avoid sugary carbonated beverages, I floss with Plackers, I brush daily with an electric toothbrush and a baking soda/peroxide toothpaste, I use a tongue scraper, and I rinse with & gargle Listerene.

ssully• 6 years ago

Literally no dentist would agree with this.

layoutIfNeeded• 6 years ago

Can lead to or correlates?

wyldfire• 6 years ago

IIUC, the article claims 'leads to':

The belief, in both colon cancer and pregnancy complications, is that the bacterium migrates from the mouth into the bloodstream (bleeding gums) and from there into other organs.

ekianjo2• 6 years ago

So counter intuitive. runs off to brush teeth

Brushing teeth excessively can/will cause bleeding gums which is exactly what you should be trying to avoid.

totally• 6 years ago

What causes one bacteria to flourish in the colon? Is it a lack of other flora? Is it diet related?

Not to be crass, but I also kind of wonder what it smells like. Are there scientists who study the smells of these biological systems? Seems like that would be a high bandwidth way to gain insight into a gut.

sjg007• 6 years ago

Diet and what other organisms are in your gut. So things like probiotics, antibiotics, etc can change it. C. diff has a funky unique smell and is an opportunistic organism that takes over sometimes and the best treatment when antibiotics fail is a fecal transplant!

octaveguin2• 6 years ago

A useful keyword in this is Helicobacter pylori.

Apparently a huge percentage of people have it, especially in developing countries but not limited to them, and it is known to cause a lot of problems though there is debate about possible benefits of it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicobacter_pylori

There is a sort of cure for it involving proton pump inhibitors and antibiotics. After which, your stomach feels a ton better and your probability of stomach cancer likely decreased.

I had chronic stomach aches since I returned from a long traveling in Thailand. Only recently did I apply this treatment. I've never had such great stomach health.

This was self-diagnosed and treated. I know what many on hacker news thinks about non-experts talking about these sorts of things in recent months. I think that's absurd.

Help yourself because no one else is more invested in your health.

elorant• 6 years ago

Same here. I have had various problems with my stomach and eventually diagnosed with H. Pylori. I went through a 10 day treatment with a lot of antibiotics and since then my stomach haven't ever bothered me again.

lupinglade• 6 years ago

Could you provide some info/links for this cure?

octaveguin2• 6 years ago

There's actually a wiki article that lists the standard protocol that a lot of research papers also say.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicobacter_pylori_eradicatio...

I went through the research papers on the subject and didn't find any indication that one treatment listed in the table did a whole lot better than another combination. Eradication rates seem to be between 70-95 percent depending on the claim of the paper which seems to be in range of likely errors with each paper.

The proton pump inhibitors are over the counter in the US but antibiotics are not (though they are in many other countries). It's a shame that the US is so restrictive here.

voisin• 6 years ago

self-diagnosed and treated

Do you mean you diagnosed this yourself, had it confirmed by a medical professional and received treatment? Or you self-treated it somehow?

Bacteria and Colon Cancer

Related Stories