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Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!floyd!vax135!ariel!norm
From: norm@ariel.UUCP (N.ANDREWS)
Newsgroups: net.med
Subject: Re: odd cancer incidence statistics
Message-ID: <467@ariel.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 28-Sep-83 18:40:42 EDT
Article-I.D.: ariel.467
Posted: Wed Sep 28 18:40:42 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 30-Sep-83 03:54:16 EDT
References: <293@hou5h.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T-ISL, Holmdel, NJ
Lines: 16

I heard somewhere that there was some evidence that uptight or neurotically
anxious people had a higher-than-average risk of getting cancer in the first
place.  If this were true, then what Paul Fox heard about people
in mental institutions having higher cancer cure rates can probably be
explained in the following manner:  Some one whose psychology causes
him to mismanage stress or experience undue anxiety will have psychosomatic
effects resulting in a greater tendency to develop some type of cancer.  If
that person is placed in a mental institution before the cancer is discovered,
his environmental situation changes in such a manner as to reduce stressful
or anxiety-producing situations and demands.  Since the development of cancer
in this individual was partly related to that stress, a reduction in stress
might make his body better able to fight off the cancer than someone whose
immune functions were impaired for other reasons.  Note that I am implying
that healthy immune function helps recovery and that anxiety impairs immune
function.
Norm Andrews, AT&T Information Systems, Holmdel, New Jersey