PBS Documentary: The Truth About Cancer

About the Program

THE TRUTH ABOUT CANCER PREMIERES ON PBS APRIL 16, 2008

Emmy Award-Winning Filmmaker Linda Garmon Takes on the Question "How Far Have We Come in the War on Cancer?"

News Journalist and Cancer Survivor Linda Ellerbee
Hosts Post-Broadcast Panel Discussion

What is the truth about cancer? Is it the same deadly killer it was 30 years ago - or are we making progress? Find out through the poignant stories of patients battling the disease. Written, produced, and directed by award-winning filmmaker Linda Garmon, The Truth About Cancer premieres nationally on PBS Wednesday, April 16, at 9:00pm ET (check local listings). Comprised of a 90-minute documentary followed by a 30-minute panel discussion, the two-hour broadcast event takes a deep look inside the cancer field gauging how far we have come in this decades-old war and asking, "Why does anyone still die of cancer?"

There is a lot of information here in addition to the documentary itself that is worth checking out, particularly the Resources section.

Acupuncture The Evidence: Documentary film

This documentary is a good and entertaining examination of acupuncture from a scientific from a skeptics point of view who examines the evidence and walks away impressed.

the programme demonstrated an experiment being conducted by Hugh MacPherson, Senior Research Fellow at the University of York. This mapped the effect of acupuncture on brain structures with both MRI and MEG scanners at the newly opened York Neuroimaging Centre. kathysykes.jpg (2129 bytes) Kathy Sykes the presenter The team found that superficial needling resulted in activation of the motor areas of the cortex, a normal reaction to the sensation of touch. But with deep needling, the brain’s limbic system, which is part of the pain matrix, was deactivated, a result that could not have been predicted from what we know about neural pathways. This line of research suggests that the deactivation of the pain matrix may explain in part the mechanism by which acupuncture has an effect when used to treat chronic pain.

Highlights:

• Open heart surgery with acupuncture and a local anasthetic. The patient is conscious for the whole operation.
  

• Good explanation of an fMRI study of the effect of acupuncture on the brain about 50 minutes into the show.

Digging into the DNA of Cancer Cells

Talk of the Nation, January 26, 2007 · Research suggests that tweaking a certain gene found in cancer tumors might stop the cancer's growth. Ronald A. DePinho, director of the Center for Applied Cancer Science at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, talks about that and other new cancer treatments.

Audio is about 20 minutes.

The story here is that over 200 billion has been spent since Nixon proclaimed a war on Cancer. Now, it is starting to pay off.

UCLA CANCER RELATED LECTURES LIVE AND ON THE WEB

Ted Mann insights into cancer series. 2007 and 2006.

Traditional Chinese Medicine and Cancer Research: Fostering Collaborations; Advancing the Science

Archived webcasts of the first and third days (April 10 and 12, 2006) of the conference Traditional Chinese Medicine and Cancer Research: Fostering Collaborations; Advancing the Science are available.

April 10, 2006
Total Running Time: 6 hours and 14 minutes

April 12, 2006
Total Running Time: 3 hours and 20 minutes

The purpose of this conference was to enlighten NCI staff about the application of various Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) modalities for cancer prevention, treatment, and symptom management. With increased knowledge about the use and potential of TCM for cancer, this conference was created to engage and facilitate discussion on the role that NCI should play in furthering research in this area.

Please Note: In order to view the webcasts, you will require RealPlayer installed on your machine. You can download the latest version of the player from the RealNetworks web site at: http://www.realnetworks.com/info/freeplayer/.