Prostate Cancer Awareness Month

This #ProstateCancerAwarenessMonth, we’re sharing insights from recent studies from researchers across Canada. Today, we’re sharing findings from Sheida Majouni, PhD candidate from Dalhousie University! In 2022, Majouni and colleagues applied machine learning to arsenic species and metal profiles of toenails from Atlantic PATH. They aimed to understand environmental metal’s potential to produce disease, specifically prostate cancer: https://bit.ly/3eVjUMK “Artificial intelligence has a unique potential to revolutionize population health,” says Dr. Syed Sibte Raza Abidi, Professor in the Faculty of Computer Science at Dalhousie University. “By discovering environmental risk factors’ influence on chronic disease risk with risk prediction models, it is a pivotal tool for mitigating the risk of chronic disease onset.” This work is being expanded with the support of a New Frontiers in Research Fund (NFRF) Exploration grant. Team members include Dr. Syed Sibte Raza Abidi (Nominated Principal Investigator), Dr. Jong Sung Kim (Co-Principal Investigator), Dr. Ellen Sweeney (Co-Investigator), Dr. Gabriela Ilie (Co-Investigator), Dr. Trevor Dummer (Co-Investigator), Dr. Taehyun Roh (Collaborator), Dr. Nathalie Saint-Jacques (Collaborator), and Jason Hicks (Collaborator). Watch this space for future findings!

Prostate Cancer Awareness Month

This #ProstateCancerAwarenessMonth, we’re sharing insights from recent studies from researchers across Canada. Today, we’re sharing findings from Gabriela Ilie, PhD, associate professor at Dalhousie University and DMRF Endowed Scientist in Cancer Quality of Life Research! In 2019, Dr. Gabriela Ilie, Dr. Rob Rutledge and Dr. Ellen Sweeney examined the association between depression and anxiety and prostate cancer. From 6,585 Atlantic PATH participants, they found that prostate cancer survivors had greater odds of screening positive for anxiety or depression compared to those with a history of other forms of cancer. The findings highlight the importance of a multidisciplinary effort to prioritize and deliver comprehensive mental health support to PCa survivors: https://bit.ly/3Dqe6oH Come 2021, they continued their work in the area of depression, anxiety and prostate cancer, further finding that the association is moderated by household income: https://bit.ly/3B9D0X3 They most recently found that prostate cancer survivors who were treated with surgery had 7.55 statistically significantly higher odds of screening positive for current depression compared to those who had surgery for other types of cancer: https://bit.ly/3S4EQPT “This pivotal research made possible by Atlantic PATH and its collaborators highlights the epidemic of mental distress among prostate cancer survivors throughout Atlantic Canada, now corroborated worldwide. This research became the impetus for development of the PC-PEP program (https://pcpep.org/) which is now helping survivors throughout Canada and beyond,” says Dr. Ilie.  

Applying Machine Learning to Arsenic Species and Metallomics Profiles of Toenails to Evaluate Associations of Environmental Arsenic with Incident Cancer Cases

Authors: Sheida Majouni, Jong Sung Kim, Ellen Sweeney, Erin Keltie, Syed Sibte Raza Abidi Ebook: Volume 294: Challenges of Trustable AI and Added-Value on Health Abstract: Chronic exposure to environmental arsenic has been linked to a number of human diseases affecting multiple organ systems, including cancer. The greatest concern for chronic exposure to arsenic is contaminated groundwater used for drinking as it is the main contributor to the amount of arsenic present in the body. An estimated 40% of households in Nova Scotia (Canada) use water from private wells, and there is a concern that exposure to arsenic may be linked to/associated with cancer. In this preliminary study, we are aiming to gain insights into the association of environmental metal’s pathogenicity and carcinogenicity with prostate cancer. We use toenails as a novel biomarker for capturing long-term exposure to arsenic, and have performed toxicological analysis to generate data about differential profiles of arsenic species and the metallome (entirety of metals) for both healthy and individuals with a history cancer. We have applied feature selection and machine learning algorithms to arsenic species and metallomics profiles of toenails to investigate the complex association between environmental arsenic (as a carcinogen) and prostate cancer. We present machine learning based models to ultimately predict the association of environmental arsenic exposure in cancer cases. doi: https://ebooks.iospress.nl/doi/10.3233/SHTI220385

New Publication

Congratulations to Majouni et al. on the new publication, “Applying Machine Learning to Arsenic Species and Metallomics Profiles of Toenails to Evaluate Associations of Environmental Arsenic with Incident Cancer Cases.” This research involves analyzing toenail samples from Atlantic PATH, as well as machine learning algorithms to arsenic species and metallomics profiles to investigate the complex association between environmental arsenic as a carcinogen and prostate cancer. https://ebooks.iospress.nl/doi/10.3233/SHTI220385  

Funding News

Congratulations to Dr. Samina Abidi, Dr. Raza Abidi, Dr. Ellen Sweeney and team on their successful CIHR Catalyst grant, “Digital Health and Artificial Intelligence based Platform for Early Chronic Disease Risk Assessment and Prediction to Improve Population Health.”  This project will leverage digital health/e-health and artificial intelligence technologies to develop a Personalized Risk Investigation, Stratification and Mitigation (PRISM) platform to assess chronic disease risk. “