Doctors seek isle smokers
for cancer-screening study
Hawaii researchers are seeking smokers and ex-smokers to help find an effective screening test for lung cancer. Hawaii is one of 30 sites in the country participating in a National Lung Screening Trial.
"Lung cancer by far and away is the leading cancer killer," said Dr. Peter Balkin, head of the radiology department at Straub Clinic & Hospital. "It is a very lethal cancer. Survival is fairly abysmal, so the idea is (to) find some screening test for lung cancer, like pap for cervical carcinoma or mammography for breast cancer, that really works."
Balkin is co-principal investigator of the Hawaii study, conducted by the Pacific Health Research Institute with Straub Clinic & Hospital, the American Cancer Society and the Cancer Research Center of Hawaii. Dr. Lance Yokochi, a Straub occupational medicine physician, is the principal investigator.
Volunteers from age 55 to 74 with a long history of smoking, or who smoked heavily and quit within the past 15 years, are being recruited to participate.
The purpose is to compare a standard chest X-ray with a low dose spiral computerized tomography scan as a screening tool for lung cancer in heavy smokers, Balkin said.
The screening program began in September 2002 with a goal to recruit 50,000 current or former smokers nationally, including 3,600 in Hawaii. So far, 1,752 volunteers have signed up, said Vicki Jenkins, coordinator of the local trial.
East Oahu real estate agent Judy Gervin said the screening trial saved her life.
She said she applied for the trial in May after three friends put postcards about it on her desk because she was a heavy smoker. She had quit in June last year, but "slipped" in March, she said.
She was selected randomly for a CT scan, performed May 27. It revealed small-cell cancer that was removed from her right lung July 25.
"Lung cancer is a silent killer, with no symptoms," said Gervin, 56, pointing out the screening trial offers people an opportunity "to take a test, to be part of a study, and have it save their lives."
Volunteers are asked brief questions to find out about their smoking history.
They are randomly given either a CT scan or chest X-ray that will be repeated one year and two years later.
They will be followed by telephone for four years to see if there is a difference in the two groups in terms of survival, Balkin said.
Gervin, who has quit smoking, said she has been "dealing with cancer successfully" since age 25 when she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
"I've survived roughly five cancers," she said. "The only way to protect yourself is to get in and get screened."
Call 522-4760 for more information or to volunteer for the lung screening trial.
