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More than 36,500 people in the UK are diagnosed with bowel cancer each year.  A five-minute screening procedure could cut their number by a third.

On 28 April 2010 the Lancet published online the remarkable results of a 16 year controlled trial led by Imperial College, London and carried out in 14 UK centres. A one-off ‘Flexi-Scope’ examination of the inside of the lower bowel in people between the ages of 55 and 64 picked up pre-cancerous polyps on the bowel wall. These were removed before they could develop into cancer. Screening was carried out on 57,099 participants, with 112,939 unscreened people as a control group. After follow up for an average of eleven years, the incidence of bowel cancer was one-third lower in those screened than in the controls, and mortality was more than 40% lower. The results of this study are so significant that Cancer Research UK is calling on the government to introduce Flexi-Scope screening alongside the current nation-wide bowel cancer screening programme that tests for traces of occult blood in faeces.

Most cases of breast and ovarian cancer do not run in families. However, two genes known as BRCA1 and BRCA2 can be passed on from parent to child and increase their risk of cancers. In 1998 Myriad Genetics was granted US patents that gave them a monopoly over lab tests for the BRCA genes. Research from Duke University in the US published in Genomics on 3 March 2010 showed that the pieces of DNA included in the patents were so broad as to extend to parts of most human genes. The American Civil Liberties Union challenged the patents in a US District Court, and on 30 March the patents were ruled invalid because Myriad had simply removed DNA that exists naturally in the body. Dr Jim Evans of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who chaired a federal task force about the role of gene patents in lab tests, said the decision was monumental and would ultimately have a big impact once it has worked its way through appeals. Many medical and scientific groups have stated that patents should not interfere with medical investigations and treatment or limit the dissemination of medical knowledge. We await challenges to this important legal decision.

Lithium is used to treat bipolar affective disorder, a mental condition characterised by cycles of depression and mania. A Patient Safety Alert about lithium was issued by the NHS National Patient Safety Agency in December 2009. A recent study had found that one in ten patients were not having regular blood tests to help adjust their lithium dosage. The study also revealed that less than half of the patients had been told about the side effects or symptoms of lithium overdose when they started treatment.

The Safety Agency has now published guidance for doctors, laboratory staff and pharmacists about ways to improve the safety of lithium treatment. It has also produced for patients an information booklet, a lithium alert card and a record book for tracking blood tests.

For more information click here.