A few weeks ago, I watched an important news on tv and I would like to share it with you: "A public hospital in the north of Spain is using a technique to prevent hair loss during chemotherapy treatment".
A scalp cooling system, applied during chemotherapy sessions, prevents hair loss as a result of treatment, with an effectiveness of between 40 and 90 per cent, depending on the type of drug used.
Hair loss is one of the side effects of the most traumatic chemotherapy for cancer patients. Between 8 and 10 per cent of them refuse to receive chemotherapy or abandon it, Carmen Yélamos, a psycho-oncologist and specialist in clinical psychology at GenesisCare, said at a press conference.
Carmen Yélamos
The procedure, which is also effective on eyebrows and eyelashes, is applied through a silicone cap, through which circulates a cooling liquid, that is connected to a machine that maintains the optimum temperature.
The silicone cap
The silicone cap applied to the head of a lady
The silicone cap connected to the machine
The lady glad with the new system
In this way, the scalp reaches a temperature of between 19 and 21 degrees, at the level of the skin, causing the toxic chemotherapy do not reach or do so, in a low percentage, to the cells of the hair follicle.
This causes a double effect. On the one hand, it reduces the blood supply by vasoconstriction of the blood vessels (partial closure) and, in addition, closes the cell membrane, to the passage of any toxic that reaches it.
"It produces a cytoprotection against chemotherapy", said the Dr. César Sebastián, president of Oncobel, the company that has implemented the system in Spain, called Paxman.
César Sebastián
The system PAXMAN
The procedure was invented, in Great Britain, in 1997, and it was refined until April 2017, when it obtained the certification of the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) of the United States, which admits its full efficacy and safety.
In Spain, it has been available since 2012, in some private hospitals and specialized centres, although it has also been applied in a public one, the Orense Hospital, through a foundation.
University Hospital Complex of Orense (South of Galice, North western Spain)
In those six years, almost 300 patients have been treated, of which 90 per cent are women and 10 per cent men, the latter over 60 almost all.
The Dr. José Luis González Larriba, head of the oncology section of the Ramón y Cajal University Hospital in Madrid, explained that hair is lost two or three weeks after starting the first cycle of chemotherapy and lasts up to six months after finishing.
Dr. Jose Luis Gonzalez Larriba
University Hospital Ramon y Cajal
The treatment increases the time the patient must remain, in the chemotherapy session, since the cap is placed approximately half an hour before the infusion of the drug and is maintained until an hour and a half, after finishing the process.
It is essential to start from the first session of chemo and can only be used in solid tumors. In the case of children, it is not applicable, since the type of cancer that they suffer is usually liquid (leukemias and lymphomas).
To be more effective, it is recommended that the hair is previously wet and it is very important that the cap is properly adjusted.
The Dr. González Larriba has assured that this procedure does not increase the incidence of metastasis in the scalp and does not decrease the efficacy of chemotherapy.
The loss of hair, as a result of chemotherapy, "is not an aesthetic problem, it is psychological", since "it can affect, during a year and a half of a patient's life, and can be devastating", warned the Dr. Escarlata López, chief of the radiotherapy oncology service of the Jiménez Díaz Foundation.
Escarlata Lopez
“The treatment costs no more than a natural hair wig and is not charged if it does not work”, the Dr. Sebastián assured.
Well, I think that it is a very important discovery, to improve the quality of life of millions of people, who suffer from cancer, throughout the world. I hope it can be used in all hospitals.
Until my next post, kind regards, Luis.
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