A September 2nd update from the FDA cites manufacturing delays at Bedford Laboratories and Teva Pharmaceuticals  for leucovorin shortages.

Here at the Colorectal Cancer Coalition, we’re hearing from patients who are not receiving leucovorin during their chemotherapy because it just isn’t available.

Bedford says that they will be releasing some 350 mg and 200 mg vials in September and are working on other presentations.  Teva is allocating 100 mg vials and says that the 350 mg vials are on back-order with an expected release date in the fourth quarter of 2010. Read the rest of this entry »

Despite guidelines calling for a colonoscopy a year after surgery for colon or rectal cancer, less than half of patients have had one 14 months after colorectal surgery intended to cure their cancer.

A study of stage I, II, and III colorectal cancer patients in the United States found that only 49 percent had received the recommended colonoscopy.

Currently follow-up guidelines call for a surveillance colonoscopy to look for local cancer recurrence or new polyps or cancers a year after surgery.  If that exam is normal, another colonoscopy is called for three years later and then every five years.  Read the rest of this entry »

The Finns are among the heaviest coffee drinkers in the world, with each person in Finland consuming more than twice as much coffee every year as the average European and nearly three times as much as Americans.

Yet, when more than 60,000 Finns were followed for more than 18 years, there was no difference in colon or rectal cancer between those who drank more than 10 cups a day and those who didn’t drink coffee at all. Read the rest of this entry »

Rectal cancer rates are increasing in people under 40, although rates of colon cancer have remained stable in younger people.

It isn’t clear why, but rectal cancer rates in this young group of men and women began increasing in 1984, rising about 3.8 percent a year.

Increases were similar for both sexes and all races. Read the rest of this entry »

Scientists have found increased immune response to antigens produced by a particular intestinal bacteria in patients with polyps and early stage I or II colorectal cancer.

Antibodies against the Streptococcus bovis antigen RpL7/L12 were higher in the blood of polyp and early cancer patients than healthy individuals.  However, the increased immune response had disappeared in patients with more advanced stage III or IV cancer. Read the rest of this entry »