All cells in our body are programmed to die. They have a limited lifespan and they die when they are damaged, worn out or no longer needed by the body. This is a normal process called apoptosis, programmed cell death, that the body depends on to be healthy. When cells die they are replaced by new ones.

In cancer cells the process of apoptosis fails and the damaged cells live on and multiply indefinitely and uncontrollably. Most chemotherapy drugs that are given to cancer patients are aimed at killing fast dividing cells, this is sometimes successful at halting the disease but these drugs damage many normal tissues.

Researchers look to find smarter drugs that do not have severe side effects but target only the cancer cell itself. A new drug being studied in the lab suggests that it may prove to be more effective and less toxic than current chemotherapy drugs. The drug called ABT-737 has a different strategy for attacking cancer. Instead of poisoning the cancer cells, the new drug attempts to reactivate the cell death program that had failed.

The leader of the project, Dr. David Huang says "Much more remains to be done to assess the drug's safety and effectiveness in patients, but early results from the laboratory are promising. Our hope is that the new drug will prove to be more effective while having fewer side effects".

Researchers have identified a damaged gene -- BRIP1 -- that doubles the risk of familial breast cancer in a small percentage of women. BRIP1 is a DNA repair gene that can lead to uncontrollable cell growth if not functioning properly. Researchers have concluded that the damaged gene increases risk for breast cancer from eight to 16 percent by age 70.

These findings won't change patient care but they may offer comfort to women who develop breast cancer and cannot pinpoint the occurrence to the commonly mutated BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes -- mutations that are responsible for the disease 80 percent of the time. And while the study of BRIP1 does add to the pool of research on breast cancer, it does not warrant screening at this time. It's just a small piece of the puzzle that one day may prove significant. For now, the risk of breast cancer resulting from a damaged BRIP1 gene is modest.

Children's Hospital of Philadelphia researchers surveyed the parents of 636 children -- parents of 318 children that had been diagnosed with brain tumors and parents of 318 children who were healthy. Based on the knowledge that heat damages sperm, they asked the parents to try to remember the frequency of exposure to excessive heat -- saunas, hot tubs and electric blankets -- in the three months leading up to the conception of their child. If the average age of children diagnosed with the two brain tumors the researchers were focused on, medulloblastoma and primitive neuroectodermal tumors, then the parents were being asked to remember back on average four to ten years.

According to the researchers report, heat exposure among the men in the three months before conception appeared to be linked to brain cancer risk among the children. The researchers do conclude by stating that the idea that paternal heat exposure before a child's conception and increased risk of these childhood brain cancers must be considered speculative until more proof is found.

The last statement made by the researchers might be the most significant. Now that I have told you what BBC News is reporting about this study, which I assume the researchers in some form released to the news media, let me say I believe you could fly a space shuttle through the speculative link between heat-damaged sperm and childhood brain tumors based on a survey. How good is your long-term memory in recalling daily life four to ten years ago? How many ways can a man's sperm become overheated?

I hope in the case of this study, the news will come with a substantial and cautionary warning that it might very well be a connection of dots that do not connect. I can think of nothing more additionally painful for a worried father who is facing his child's cancer diagnosis, than to have it even suggested that his overheated sperm might be the reason for his child's suffering -- when in fact it might have nothing at all to do with his child's brain tumor. The only known fact about childhood brain tumors is that researchers are looking into environmental and genetic factors for clues, and there is little concrete evidence as to what causes childhood brain tumors.

Several boxes containing injections of Neulasta have lined the bottom of my refrigerator for more than a year. They are left-overs from chemotherapy -- from a time when one needle pierced the skin on my arm after each chemo treatment to keep my blood counts in a safe range. I've looked at them day after day after day, and I've allowed them to sit in the same exact spot for all this time. But today, they are in the trash -- not because I made a conscious choice to throw them away but because water spilled all over the inside of my refrigerator and left them soggy and damaged. Surely I would not have used them in this condition, I thought -- so I tossed them. But really, I would not have used them anyway. They were old -- probably past their expiration date -- and I am not receiving chemotherapy anymore. I had absolutely no use for them. But I kept them for safety or comfort or some other impractical reason -- for the same reason I keep a basket full of old medication in my kitchen cupboard. It's all cancer-related -- most of it never touched because I don't really like taking medication, even when necessary. So this stock-piling tendency defies all logic for me. Until today -- when part of my past sits in a white trash bag, ready for the curb, and the rest of it is soon to be trashed. So I can continue moving forward. Away from cancer. For good.