According to the American Cancer Society, the second leading cause of death among American women today is breast cancer. In order to detect cysts, calcifications and tumors within the breast, typically women over the age of 35 make a trip to their OBGYN to receive a yearly mammogram. However, Chyke A. Doubeni, M.D., M.P.H., of the University of Massachusetts Medical Center claims that, "Despite their [women] significant risk for development of a new breast tumor, even women who comply with a recommended yearly mammogram gradually fall by the wayside over the years." On the other hand, in a recent experiment at the
An analysis of the saliva may eventually help gynecologists to also detect other disease states. A study conducted at the e part of a larger investigation involving risk factors for osteoporosis and oral bone loss (see picture to left), were examined for specific periodontal pathogens, mainly P. gigivalis and T. forsynthesis. These two pathogens were found to infect 15.1 percent and 37.9 percent of these women. In addition, two other pathogens, P. intermedia and C. rectus, were found in 43.4 percent and 17.4 percent of women. If indeed these oral pathogens are related to bone loss in the mouth, it is conceivable that this may prove to be an easy, reasonably priced, and risk free test that may help in the diagnosis of systemic osteoporosis. It is well known that obese women compared to women with normal BMIs have a lower risk of developing osteoporosis due to effects of estrogen and weight bearing on bone preservation. However, this study also found that the greatest risk for oral bone loss was found in overweight women, supported by a three-fold increase. These seemingly contradicting discoveries only support the fact that further research needs to be done to elucidate the seemingly conflicting results. Since the cost of the current bone density test used by gynecologists is so significant, if further investigation of this new diagnostic tool could prove to help predict systemic osteoporosis, health care costs could be decreased dramatically.
Salivary analysis could also help infectious disease specialists diagnose viral infections. Although typically these viruses are found through examination of blood samples, Farmer, Clewley, Griffiths, and Johnson of the U.S. National Institute of Health claim that, "The sensitivity of the saliva Murex GACELISA is the same as the routine serum testing assay." For example, salivary IgA levels tend to decline as an HIV patient becomes symptomatic. Therefore, it may be that the detection of IgA antibody to HIV (see picture to right) in saliva may indicate the progression of the HIV infection. Similar studies have used saliva samples as a successful tool for diagnosis of hepatitis A and hepatitis B, based on the levels of IgM antibodies in saliva. In particular, it has been found that low levels of IgM are associated with vaccine-induced immunity. Just as the comparison of serum and saliva levels of antibody to HIV have been directly correlated, so have the levels of antibody for hepatitis (sensitivity = 98.7% and specificity = 99.6%). Since it has been discovered that in certain cases saliva and serum analysis are equally effective in the diagnoses of some diseases, this new technique may be advantageous. This needle-less method of analysis is not only simple and cost effective, but it is also beneficial to those patients, like hemophiliacs and drug users, who have difficulty in accessing peripheral blood.
Saliva samples are also being used to predict and monitor drug and hormone levels, certain autoimmune diseases, and hereditary diseases like cystic fibrosis. Still, many physicians are hesitant to believe that it could ever truly be considered a valid method for accurately predicting systemic diseases. For instance, Irwin Mandel, a professor emeritus of Columbia University, believes that, "Saliva doesn't have the drama of blood and the salivary glands are only lowly excretory organs." Although plenty of further research is necessary to make this new diagnostic tool legitimate, it is still very encouraging to believe that in the very near future, health care providers may have a painless, efficient, and cost effective way for detecting several of today’s most common diseases. After all, swabs of certain body surfaces that were at one point thought to be unreliable have proven to save lives, and the classic example is George Papanicolaou’s Pap Smear.
2 comments:
I'm glad I read this post, because it actually struck closer to home I thought it would. In the post, you discuss the notion of going to the dentist's office as an alternative to going to the doctor's office, when it comes time to search for those systemic diseases. As someone who is mortally afraid of the doctor's office's, I would welcome the opportunity to instead go to the dentist with open arms. Seriously, more often than not I would rather hug my mother's cat (and I hate cats) than go to the doctor. Beyond my own selfish scope, the ideas the post proposes about a swab in the dentist's office replacing those painful doctor's exams; searching for cancers, venereal diseases, etc, is eye opening. The main area I would suggest you focus on improving, albeit this is a somewhat of a nit-picking area, is that you focus on the actual language of the blog. By introducing so many sentences (especially in the 2nd paragraph) with prepositional clauses, the actual read of the post becomes somewhat tiresome and repetitive. If you work on varying sentence structure a little more, you will be able to make an enjoyable read of any subject, even dentistry
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