BBC News: Urine bugs may be a sign of aggressive prostate cancer

[Andy]

"Scientists say they have identified urine bacteria which are linked to aggressive prostate cancer.

The discovery might provide new ways to spot and even prevent these dangerous tumours, experts hope.

It's too soon to say if the bacteria might cause the cancer, rather than just be a helpful marker.

The University of East Anglia team which found the link plan more work to see if clearing the infection might prevent bad tumours."


And the bit that I thought was particularly interesting (my bolding)


"They identified five types of bacteria which were common in urine and tissue samples from men whose cancers ultimately went on to be aggressive.

All were types of bacteria that can grow without oxygen. Some were brand new types, never found until now."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-61150771

 

[Andy]

The actual study

Microbiomes of Urine and the Prostate Are Linked to Human Prostate Cancer Risk Groups

Abstract

Background
Bacteria play a suspected role in the development of several cancer types, and associations between the presence of particular bacteria and prostate cancer have been reported.

Objective
To provide improved characterisation of the prostate and urine microbiome and to investigate the prognostic potential of the bacteria present.

Design, setting, and participants
Microbiome profiles were interrogated in sample collections of patient urine (sediment microscopy: n = 318, 16S ribosomal amplicon sequencing: n = 46; and extracellular vesicle RNA-seq: n = 40) and cancer tissue (n = 204).

Outcome measurements and statistical analysis
Microbiomes were assessed using anaerobic culture, population-level 16S analysis, RNA-seq, and whole genome DNA sequencing.

Results and limitations
We demonstrate an association between the presence of bacteria in urine sediments and higher D’Amico risk prostate cancer (discovery, n = 215 patients, p < 0.001; validation, n = 103, p < 0.001, χ2 test for trend). Characterisation of the bacterial community led to the (1) identification of four novel bacteria (Porphyromonas sp. nov., Varibaculum sp. nov., Peptoniphilus sp. nov., and Fenollaria sp. nov.) that were frequently found in patient urine, and (2) definition of a patient subgroup associated with metastasis development (p = 0.015, log-rank test). The presence of five specific anaerobic genera, which includes three of the novel isolates, was associated with cancer risk group, in urine sediment (p = 0.045, log-rank test), urine extracellular vesicles (p = 0.039), and cancer tissue (p = 0.035), with a meta-analysis hazard ratio for disease progression of 2.60 (95% confidence interval: 1.39–4.85; p = 0.003; Cox regression). A limitation is that functional links to cancer development are not yet established.

Conclusions
This study characterises prostate and urine microbiomes, and indicates that specific anaerobic bacteria genera have prognostic potential.

Open access, https://euoncology.europeanurology.com/article/S2588-9311(22)00056-6/fulltext

 

[JemPD]

All were types of bacteria that can grow without oxygen. Some were brand new types, never found until now."

But no, surely they have written that incorrectly? i mean if they weren't found until now, then they cant possibly have even existed before now....

 

[Mithriel]

Of course interstitial cystitis is an FND because there is no infection because urine is sterile. Wait a minute, they found microbes in urine by growing them a different way, possibly PCR.

In science, finding something gives you definite information but not finding something does not. It could be that it was there but your detection methods were faulty.

Over and over I have seen things that were definitely... whatever shown to be wrong a few years down the line. And what happens then is that there is no looking back so you would never know they had been wrong before.

 

[rvallee]

Over and over I have seen things that were definitely... whatever shown to be wrong a few years down the line. And what happens then is that there is no looking back so you would never know they had been wrong before.

That's a key missing piece that's almost never discussed. It's emblematic of failure, to simply not have any process, or even interest, in trying to figure out why things failed and how to improve on them. This simply does not exist, the idea is to move on, never hold anyone accountable, mistakes are always passive, they happened, no one could have done any differently. There is simply no examination, failures are either not spoken of, or only as vague references to a distant past. The whole MUS project is built from this, basically considers the mere possibility that any of this could be wrong a taboo that cannot be mentioned.

This is especially important as no matter how far back you go in the history of psychosomatic ideology, this assertion that mistakes are in the past is always present, like a mantra. This is failure by design: any future mistakes are asserted to be impossible, since it's been so long since any such mistakes have been acknowledged, because they are simply never acknowledged. It's too easy to blame the patients, there are always more patients to blame for medicine's failures.