Articles by Harriette Boucher

The over-the-counter medication which could help reduce risk of skin cancer

Nicotinamide, a form of vitamin B people can get over the counter at pharmacies, can reduce the risk of skin cancer returning by repairing DNA damage, according to new research. A study of more than 33,000 people who had survived skin cancer found there was a 14 per cent risk reduction from taking oral nicotinamide. It saw a 54 per cent risk reduction for people who started taking it after a first skin cancer diagnosis, but this rate decreased in people who had had skin cancer multiple times. One of the study’s authors, dermatology professor Lee Wheless, said: “What we saw was that the earlier you start taking this in the skin cancer journey, the better it works. “(Skin cancer) is an extremely common and, fortunately, not a very high mortality cancer, but the morbidity from skin cancer is very, very high. There are lots of patients who develop multiple skin cancers.” The study used the data of more than 33,000 veterans in the US who had skin cancer in the past. More than 12,000 patients took 500mg of nicotinamide twice a day for longer than 30 days, and compared to more than 21,000 unexposed patients. Mr Wheless said it is thought that nicotinamide can improve the skin’s ability to repair DNA damage caused by ultraviolet radiation, and can also decrease the immunosuppression that is triggered by ultraviolet radiation. “So if we're repairing damage faster and we're not blocking the immune system from clearing out precancerous cells, that's going to reduce our risk of skin cancer,” he said. “If we have lower background damage, and we're slowing the rate of accumulating new damage, it's going to take longer to get back up to that threshold to develop a new skin cancer.” The study identified the greatest risk reduction for cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma, the second most common type of skin cancer in the UK. It did not look at melanoma or some other types of skin cancer. In England, there are around 155,000 cases of non-melanoma skin cancer each year, according to Cancer Research UK. The charity has previously warned that although research has suggested that nicotinamide may slow down the rate at which the disease comes back, it will not protect you from the sun. As skin cancer referrals continue to rise in the UK, the NHS is using new measures of detection. This year, it deployed an artificial intelligence screening tool which analyses images of lesions and detects signs of potential skin cancer. The technology has been conditionally approved for the next three years and has assessed more than 200,000 patients in the NHS. The technology is one of the many ways the UK’s health sector continues to employ AI. Earlier this year, a researcher from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh developed a similar system which allows a patient to take a photograph of their skin, which is analysed by AI, and then returned with a diagnosis.

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