Duke University
Medical Center
Intercom
VOL. 24, NO. 45
NOV. 11, 1977
DURHAM, N.C.
New treatment destroys cancerous tumors
By William Erwin
Duke researchers have used a
combination of microwaves and X-ray
therapy to destroy cancerous tumors in
seven patients.
In a paper prepared for delivery last
week at a meeting of the International
Union of Radio Science in Airlie, Va., Dr.
William T. Joines said that the tumors
vanished in no more than four and a half
weeks with the combination treatment.
Joines said the microwaves apparently
help by heating the tumors — similar to
the action of a microwave oven — thus
hindering the ability of cancer cells to
repair themselves after X-ray damage.
The combined treatment, still
experimental, could give doctors a new
way to attack tumors that resist other
forms of therapy, the researchers said in
an interview.
COMBINED TREATMENT—Several patients have been successfuUy'
treated for tumors when microwaves were used to heat the tumors
following X-ray treatment. The aluminum-covered box on the patient's
back transmits the microwaves. Aluminum tape is used to protect
surrounding skin. R.T. Bonnie Gunter consults a dial which registers
how hot the tumor has become. (Photo by Sally Herndon)
Study of ethics finds place in curriculum
By David Williamson
A young Duke physician who is trying to help medical
students develop a better understanding of the ethical and
philosophical problems of their profession has received a $5,000
grant from the Hunt Foundation of Pittsburgh, Pa.
The grant will provide 12 months of partial salary support for
Dr. Allen R. Dyer, assistant professor of psychiatry and
community and family medicine.
"In many medical schools, people used to have the feeling that
ethics wasn't a legitimate academic discipline," Dyer said,
explaining his work in an interview. "Ethics was considered
more a 'beer and pretzels' kind of subject — one discussed at
someone's apartment after more serious study had been
completed."
Questions led to programs in ethics
But about 10 years ago, that feeling rightfully began to
change, he said.
Questions about abortion, informed consent, the role of
government in nnedicine and technological advances that could
prolong the length, but not necessarily the quahty, of life
combined to make physicians reassess their responsibihties to
society.
Since then. Dyer said, more than half of the nation's 116
medical schools have adopted programs in medical ethics and
humanities.
A course taught by the Duke graduate entitled "Philosophical
Problems for Physicians" is part of the School of Medicine's
effort to help students learn an approach to dealing with the
broad questions of human values and meaning and to clarify
their own professional identities.
To preserve human values
"The course, which couf^les in-depth discussions with
readings in literature, poetry, philosophy, psychology and
sociology, is not so much an effort to sensitize very
mechanistically-oriented students," Dyer said. "Rather it is an
attempt to enable them to preserve the human values that they
do possess in the face of the many demands of the profession."
He said he is encouraged that the students have shown
themselves to be not only "very sophisticated," but also'^ery
concerned with social issues."
"In the popular imagination, doctors are sometimes
considered callous and insensitive," he said. "In my experience,
that hasn't been the case."
Dyer said the Hunt Foundation grant also would help to
support his research into the ways human values, particularly
those learned in childhood and adolescence, influence medical
and psychiatric practice.
All of the tumors successfully treated
were located on the skin or immediately
below the surface. Six of the patients
were terminally ill.
Other tumors in the same patients
were treated with X-rays alone or
microwaves alone. These tumors shrank
about 40 per cent, Joines said.
Joines is an associate professor of
electrical engineering and a specialist in
microwaves. He worked on the project
with a team of researchers from the
Comprehensive Cancer Center.
One and one is three
Using the two treatments together is
"like adding one and one and getting
three," one of the researchers. Dr.
Raymond U, explained.
Joines and U, an associate professor of
radiology, conducted the treatment study
with three other Duke radiologists and
Comprehensive Cancer Center faculty
members: Dr. Lowell S. Miller, a
professor; Dr. Kent T. Woodward, an
associate professor; and Dr. K. Thomas
Noell, an assistant professor.
Their work was supported partially by
grants from the National Cancer
Institute.
Opens up new treatment
"This opens up the treatment of
tumors that ordinarily respond poorly to
radiation," Noell said. "It also could help
patients whose cancer goes away but then
returns.
"We treated a woman early this year
who had an enormous bulk of tumor on
her chest. It was four inches by five inches
across and 2Vi inches deep.She had been
treated with every type of chemotherapy
(drugs) known to man, but had failed to
respond. She already had had radiation
therapy, so we couldn't come back with
another massive dose. She couldn't
tolerate it," he said.
Instead of the usual dose of radiation,
(Continued on page 3)
f
DR. ALLEN R. DYER