Lung Cancer Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Senate Health Committee Focuses On Tobacco Cessation and Lung Health

A bill prohibiting smoking in a vehicle when a minor is present passed the Senate Committee on Health and Human Resources on Tuesday.

If Senate Bill 378 is signed into law, a person 18 or older would not be allowed to possess or smoke a lit tobacco product in a motor vehicle when a person 16 years or younger is present.

Violators of the possible new law could be charged with a misdemeanor and subject to a $25 fine if they’re already being pulled over for committing another code violation.

Sen. Tom Takubo, R-Kanawha and vice chair of the committee, spoke in favor of passage of the bill.

“It’s the most severe thing in terms of fear of any patient when they have a condition where they literally can’t breathe,” Takubo said. “And when you’re in a confined space, like a vehicle, these kids’ asthma flare tremendously.”

The bill was passed by the Senate Committee on Health and Human Resources and now heads to the full Senate for their consideration.

Senate Bill 514 was also considered by the committee. This bill creates the Lung Cancer Screening and Education Act, directing the West Virginia Department of Health to establish a public education outreach campaign to publicize lung cancer screening and education services.

According to counsel, the bill also creates a fund that would be annually funded by $100,000 from tobacco tax funding and may include money appropriated by the legislature or by the federal government. The bill also allows for public and private funding sources.

To qualify for a lung screening under Senate Bill 514, a patient’s income must be at or below 300 percent of the federal poverty level. Also, the patient must be medically eligible, which includes, but is not limited to 50 to 80-year-olds who have at least a “20 pack year” smoking history and who are currently smoke, or have quit within the past 15 years.

The bill describes a “pack year” as smoking an average of one pack of cigarettes per day for one year. So based upon the language in the bill, a person would have a 20-pack-year history of smoking one pack a day for 20 years.

The fund must be the patient’s last resort and payment for the procedure can be adjusted yearly based upon inflation.

Takubo also spoke in favor of Senate Bill 514, citing statistics from 1950 to show just how far the United States has not come.

“When you go back to 1950, the overall survival for lung cancer was 8 percent,” Takubo said. “Speed all the way up to 2013 and the survival rate only went to 15 percent. It hadn’t even doubled – a 7 percent improvement in 63 years in advances in medicine.”

Takubo said the availability of lung screenings could save lives.

“If you’re in that high risk pool, just getting a low-dose CAT scan, you lay on the table, hold your breath, in and out,” Takubo said. “It’s that fast. No needle sticks, no contrast. That one test alone decreased the risk of dying by 20 percent.”

Takubo also said that about 8 percent of West Virginians qualify for a screening.

Appalachia Health News is a project of West Virginia Public Broadcasting with support from Charleston Area Medical Center and Marshall Health.

W.Va. Ranks Poorly In National Lung Cancer Report

Lung cancer and smoking rates in the state lag behind the rest of the country and aren’t showing any signs of improvement, according to a new report.

The American Lung Association’s 2023 “State of Lung Cancer” report ranked West Virginia 47 out of 48 states included in the report for new lung cancer cases.

“Unfortunately, West Virginia ranked second highest in the nation for new lung cancer cases, and the worst in the nation for adults who currently smoke,” said Aimee Van Cleave, advocacy director for the American Lung Association in West Virginia. “So there’s so much more work that is needed to reduce the burden of lung cancer, particularly in West Virginia.”

According to the report, West Virginians aren’t surviving lung cancer, either.

Bob Herron, a thoracic surgeon and the director of lung cancer screening at WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital in Wheeling, said while the numbers say the state is making slow, steady progress, there’s still a lot of work to do.

“We are at the bottom of the lists of a lot of the major categories such as the new lung cancer cases,” Herron said. “I believe we were 47 out of 51. And we also ranked 37 out of 42 in lung cancer survival at 22.4 percent.”

The national survival rate is 26 percent. While rates of smoking in West Virginia are alarming, Van Cleave said there are other contributing factors to West Virginia’s rates of lung cancer.

“The bottom line is, if you have lungs, you can get lung cancer,” Van Cleave said. “So while smoking is the leading risk factor for lung cancer, there are so many other things that contribute to that as well, including environmental air quality, including exposure to radon and even your genetics.”

Radon is a naturally occurring, colorless, odorless and tasteless gas. Van Cleave said homeowners should keep Radon detectors up to date to avoid exposure. West Virginia ranked 31 out of 51 states and Puerto Rico surveyed in Radon exposure.

“If you’re breathing things in the air that your body is not meant to breathe, that has detrimental impacts on your body, which is why we spend so much time at the lung association looking at all of the different risk factors related to lung cancer,” Van Cleave said.

Van Cleave and Herron encouraged people who might be at high risk to take a survey at savedbythescan.org. It helps determine eligibility for a new kind of low-dose CT scan to check for lung cancer.

“I would implore people who fit that bill to ask their primary care physician about it and to get the ball rolling to get a low dose CT to evaluate for a lung nodule, or potential lung cancer that could be potentially, discovered in the earlier stages as opposed to the later stages, which, as everybody knows, an early stage cancer is so much more feasible and easier to cure than the latter stage,” Herron said.

According to Van Cleave, a long-term solution to the lung cancer and smoking problem could be brought about by legislative action from state lawmakers.

“That is why the lung association calls on state legislators to increase funding for tobacco control of cessation efforts, which have been dramatically underfunded year after year to the cost of countless lives,” Van Cleave said.

While West Virginia has shown improvement over the past five years in new cases, survival and early diagnosis, experts say there is still plenty of work to do.

Appalachia Health News is a project of West Virginia Public Broadcasting with support from Charleston Area Medical Center and Marshall Health.

‘Gear Up’ Tackles College Enrollment Challenges And State Smoking Rates Lag Behind Nation, This West Virginia Morning

On this West Virginia Morning, lung cancer and smoking rates in the state lag behind the rest of the country and aren’t showing any signs of improvement, according to a new report.

On this West Virginia Morning, lung cancer and smoking rates in the state lag behind the rest of the country and aren’t showing any signs of improvement, according to a new report. Emily Rice has more.

Also, in this show, colleges and universities in the state are working to face enrollment challenges head on. One element in that effort is the statewide “Gear Up” program, encouraging high school seniors to get ready for college and careers. Randy Yohe has more.

And Tuesday marked the 53rd anniversary of the Marshall University plane crash. Seventy-five people, football team players, coaches, staff, supporters and the flight crew perished returning from an away game at East Carolina. Every year, on this day, Marshall remembers the 75. Randy Yohe has our story.

West Virginia Morning is a production of West Virginia Public Broadcasting which is solely responsible for its content.

Support for our news bureaus comes from Shepherd University.

Listen to West Virginia Morning weekdays at 7:43 a.m. on WVPB Radio or subscribe to the podcast and never miss an episode. #WVMorning

Study Shows Coal Miners Face Higher Risk Of Death From Lung Disease

The University of Illinois Chicago and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention studied more than 235,000 coal miners who died between 1979 and 2017.

This story was updated to note that coal miners were found to have a lower risk of dying from heart disease, not of developing it.

A federal government study shows that coal miners face a higher risk for death from lung disease, including black lung.

Coal miners born in 1940 or after have an eight times greater likelihood of dying from nonmalignant respiratory disease than the general population.

The University of Illinois Chicago and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention studied more than 235,000 coal miners who died between 1979 and 2017.

The study found they had far greater odds of dying of black lung, COPD and lung cancer than the general population. Modern miners face greater risk than their predecessors, and the risk is concentrated in three Appalachian states: Kentucky, Virginia and West Virginia.

Severe black lung disease, which is caused by inhalation of mine dust, is more frequent in younger miners, the study found.

The only bright spot: coal miners were found to have a lower risk of dying from heart disease than the general population.

The Mine Safety and Health Administration is expected to issue a new rule on coal dust exposure in mines.

Lung Association Encourages More Screenings

The American Lung Association is encouraging West Virginians to get screened for lung cancer.

In West Virginia, about 2,050 people are expected to be diagnosed with lung cancer this year and more than half, 1,190, will die from the disease. It’s the leading cause of cancer death in the country. The association says the key to survival is early detection.

The Preventive Services Task Force recently expanded guidelines of who should be screened. Now, anyone aged 50 to 80 who has a 20 pack-year smoking history and currently smokes or has quit within the past 15 years should be screened.

The screening involves a CT scan or special X-ray that takes multiple images. Those images are then put together on a computer. Contact your healthcare provider to get started.

Mobile Lung Cancer Screening Unit Visiting 3 W.Va. Counties

A mobile lung cancer screening unit that offers service to West Virginia counties without easy access to screenings will be visiting three counties next week.

The unit known as LUCAS will visit Preston, Taylor and Marion counties. The unit is operated by WVU Medicine-WVU Hospitals and the WVU Cancer Institute.

Screenings will be offered on June 7 at West Preston Primary Care in Reedsville, call (304) 594-4705 for an appointment; on June 8 at Grafton-Taylor Health Department, (304) 233-0830; and on June 10 at Monongahela Valley Association Clinic in Fairmont, (304) 367-8736.

Private insurance, Medicaid or Medicare will be billed for the screenings. Uninsured West Virginia residents who meet the criteria can receive screenings through grant funding and donations, WVU Medicine said in a news release.