Cancer | featured news

Former heavyweight boxing champion Joe Frazier died Monday, after he was diagnosed with liver cancer, his family said in a statement. Frazier was 67. "We The Family of ... Smokin' Joe Frazier, regret to inform you of his passing," the statement said. "He transitioned from this life as 'One of God's Men,' on the eve of November 7, 2011 at his home in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania."

Former heavyweight champion Joe Frazier has liver cancer and is under hospice care. The 67-year-old boxer was diagnosed four or five weeks ago, Frazier's personal and business manager said Saturday.

Whether sipping beer, wine or whiskey, women who drink just three alcoholic beverages a week face slightly higher chances for developing breast cancer compared with teetotalers, a study of more than 100,000 U.S. nurses found.

A "fatty apron" in the abdomen help fuel the spread of ovarian cancer, research suggests. In 80% of cases, it has spread to this apron, called the omentum, by the time it is diagnosed.

Steve Jobs had a long run with a rare form of cancer (a pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor) that is sometimes curable by early surgery. While I was not his physician and don't have access to the details of his illness or its treatment, assertions that his use of alternative medicine shortened his life strike me as uninformed.

Boys ages 11 and 12 years should be routinely vaccinated against the human papillomavirus, or HPV, to protect against anal, mouth and neck cancers that can result from sexual activity, a federal advisory committee said.

Basal cell carcinoma is the most common form of skin cancer. A diet that contains even a small protective factor may have great impact.

Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez likely has less than two years to live, his former doctor said, as the ailing firebrand traveled to Cuba for a checkup following cancer treatment.

There's more news on cancer screening tests - this time for women. Scientists advising the government say a Pap test is a good way to screen young and middle-aged women for cervical cancer, and it's only needed once every three years. But they say there is not enough evidence yet to back testing for HPV, the virus that causes the disease.

Large daily doses of vitamin E, long touted as a virtual wonder drug that could protect against cancer, heart disease, dementia and other ailments, increase the risk for prostate cancer among middle-aged men, according to a large federal study released Tuesday. The analysis of data from more than 35,000 healthy men concluded that those who took vitamin E every day at the relatively large dose levels commonly sold in drug, grocery and health food stores were 17 percent more likely to develop prostate cancer.