Two years ago, in 2023, it came as a shock for fans to learn that veteran actress Sharmila Tagore was battling cancer. She was diagnosed with lung cancer, but at stage zero. Recently, her daughter Soha Ali Khan opened up about the experience of her mother being diagnosed early on and how it helped her in treatment and recovery.

In an interaction with Nayandeep Rakshit, she said, "With my mother, she was one of the very few people to be diagnosed with lung cancer at stage zero, and no chemotherapy, nothing. It was cut out of her and she is, touchwood, fine."

The first time the conversation about this was made publicly was during Sharmila's appearance on Koffee with Karan. Host Karan Johar had said, "I would offered Sharmila ji the part played by Shabana ji. She was my very first choice. But because of health reasons at that time, she couldn't say yes." To this, Sharmila responded, "After my cancer...they didn't want me to take that risk."

What Is Stage Zero Lung Cancer?

As per the American Lung Association, Stage Zero is an early-stage lung cancer that is only in the top lining of the lung or bronchus and has not yet spread.

Why Is Staging So Important?

The American Lung Association notes that once your specific type of lung cancer has been identified, the next crucial step in the journey from diagnosis to treatment is staging. This process determines how far the cancer has spread and helps your care team design the most effective treatment plan for you.

To assign a cancer stage, doctors use a combination of imaging tests—such as CT scans and PET scans—and tissue tests like biopsies. These provide a comprehensive view of the cancer’s location and extent.

Staging does more than guide treatment—it also offers insight into your overall prognosis, or likely course of the disease. By looking at data from other patients with the same type and stage of lung cancer, doctors can estimate outcomes. However, it’s important to remember that each case is unique, and no doctor can predict exactly how your cancer will respond to treatment or determine your life expectancy with certainty.

The staging process can vary depending on the individual case. Generally, it starts before treatment begins, based on the results of imaging and biopsy tests. This is called the clinical stage.

For some patients, doctors recommend pre-treatment intranodal staging—also known as invasive nodal staging or intrathoracic staging. This involves examining the lymph nodes in the chest to see if cancer has spread there. Understanding this early can be especially important if the cancer hasn’t yet reached other organs, as it helps doctors determine the full extent of the disease and tailor the treatment accordingly.

Pre-treatment intranodal staging is best done before therapy begins and can sometimes alter the clinical stage based on more detailed information. Two procedures commonly used for this are:

EBUS-TBNA (Endobronchial Ultrasound with Transbronchial Needle Aspiration): A minimally invasive test that uses a bronchoscope and a needle to collect tissue or fluid samples from chest lymph nodes.

Mediastinoscopy: A surgical procedure that allows doctors to examine and take samples from the mediastinum—the space behind the breastbone between the lungs.

If a patient undergoes surgery as their first treatment, doctors may assign a pathological stage afterward. This combines the clinical stage with findings from the surgery itself, often providing a more accurate picture of the disease and informing future treatment steps.

If the cancer returns after treatment, it will be restaged, often using the same types of tests that were done during the initial diagnosis.

What Determines Lung Cancer Stage?

Lung cancer staging is based on three main criteria, commonly referred to as the TNM system:

T (Tumor): Size of the tumor and its exact location in the lung.

N (Nodes): Whether the cancer has spread to nearby lymph nodes, especially in the chest.

M (Metastasis): Whether the cancer has spread to other organs in the body.

Each of these components is assigned a value, which is then used to determine the overall stage of the cancer. This system helps guide treatment decisions and gives patients and caregivers a better understanding of the disease.

In an breakthrough scientific discovery, scientists have found that a common diabetes medication taken by millions globally—metformin, may provide unexpected protection against acute myeloid leukemia (AML), a fast-growing and frequently fatal type of blood cancer. This has been established by a new study by the University of Cambridge, which has been published in the highly-respected journal Nature. The study suggests metformin to be a low-cost, safe preventative therapy for individuals who are at high risk of developing AML.

This finding may represent a paradigm change in the approach to cancer prevention in medicine—particularly in hematological malignancies where early intervention is usually restrictive.

In contrast to solid cancers like breast or prostate cancer, which at times may be removed surgically, blood cancers are more difficult to localize and destroy. As Cambridge Stem Cell Institute Professor George Vassiliou describes it, "With blood cancers, we must first find people at risk and then apply medical treatments to halt cancer growth across the body." AML, which begins in the bone marrow and develops quickly, is an example of this difficulty.

Approximately 3,100 individuals in the UK are diagnosed with AML every year. It has a poor prognosis and few treatment options, especially in the elderly. Although the latest advances in blood testing are able to indicate individuals at risk years earlier than before, to date, there has not been a sure way to stop AML from forming.

How Diabetes Drug Interrupts Cancer Development at the Cellular Level?

Scientists targeted their research on DNMT3A, a gene commonly mutated in AML patients. This one mutation is thought to trigger as much as 15% of all AML. Metformin seems to break the energy metabolism of these pre-leukemic cells, targeting their aberrant growth pathways. By disabling the cells' capacity to produce energy, metformin stops them from developing into full-blown leukemia.

Additional analysis of health information from more than 412,000 UK Biobank participants reinforced the link. Metformin users had a significantly lower incidence of damaging mutations in the DNMT3A gene, whether or not they had diabetes. The results indicate a protective effect that is independent of the drug's initial purpose.

What is Metformi?

The origins of metformin trace back to medicinal plants used during medieval Europe. Isolated from Galega officinalis, a plant used in traditional medicine to cure urinary and metabolic problems, its active ingredient—guanidine—was discovered to lower blood sugar in the early 20th century. Although it was disfavored for a period, metformin was re-released and approved in Europe in the 1950s and subsequently by the FDA in 1995. It's now most commonly prescribed diabetes medication globally, especially in patients who have type 2 diabetes and are unable to regulate blood sugar levels by diet and exercise alone.

How Metformin Works?

Decreasing the level of glucose absorbed by the intestines through food.

Suppressing the liver's release of glucose.

Increasing insulin sensitivity, so that the body can utilize glucose more effectively.

These metabolic actions are not only helpful for controlling diabetes, but potentially for stopping or slowing other disease processes—such as cancer.

Benefits of Metformin

What's even more amazing is how metformin's benefits go beyond controlling blood sugar. According to Harvard Health and other medical centers, the medication has been linked with:

• Reduced cardiovascular mortality among diabetics
• Moderate weight loss
• Decreased risk for type 2 diabetes in persons with prediabetes
• Help with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS)
• Lower risk for cancers such as breast, colon, and prostate
• Possible diminishment of risk for dementia and stroke

Off-label prescriptions have also been used for some of these indications in metformin, highlighting the drug's versatile utility and solid safety profile.

One of the main advantages of metformin is its long history of safety. Taken by millions of people over many decades, it tends to have only minor side effects—e.g., nausea, bloating, or altered taste. Serious side effects, such as lactic acidosis, are infrequent and typically only occur in those with existing kidney disease.

As Blood Cancer UK's Director of Research Dr. Rubina Ahmed put it, "Repurposing existing, safe drugs such as metformin allows the possibility that new treatments might get to people earlier, without going through the extensive drug development pathways."

Most of us, use the restroom is an effortless way, there is an urge to pee and so it is an easy, unconscious act. For 27-year-old Anna Gray from Bath, England, such a simple function was an impossible task—a task that defined her life for six long years! Diagnosed with Fowler's Syndrome, a rare and painful urinary disorder, Anna has spent more than a half-dozen years having to use catheters just to empty her bladder.

Anna's health emergency started in November 2018 when she was hospitalized with a severe kidney infection—brought on by not being able to urinate for several days. Physicians initially thought it was an isolated incident. But when her bladder had to be drained of almost two liters of urine and the issue continued, it was evident this was no typical infection.

Just weeks after that, another hospitalization uncovered something disturbing: Anna's bladder was not functioning at all. After invasive procedures, the reason still eluded her. Specialists eventually diagnosed her with Fowler's Syndrome—a condition so uncommon, even seasoned urologists had encountered only a handful of cases.

"I was informed there was nothing further that could be done," Anna remembered in an interview. "I couldn't comprehend how it could occur to me."

By 2020, after years of repeated infections and hospital stays, Anna was fitted with a suprapubic catheter—a tube inserted through her belly directly into her bladder. The catheter empties urine into a collection bag, which she has to empty several times a day.

"Coming to terms with this being my life now was really hard," she said. "There were mental health issues. I was in the hospital last year for depression."

In January 2024, Anna developed sepsis around her catheter site—a life-threatening complication that led to three weeks in intensive care. Yet despite the setbacks, she refuses to hide her condition.

“I wear shorts, tops—you can see the bag. It doesn’t bother me. People ask questions, and I’m fine with that.”

Because of the paucity of her condition, Anna first felt extremely isolated. "I felt like I was the only person in the world experiencing this," she said. But that ended when she learned about online support groups for Fowler's Syndrome patients.

"Meeting others who understood was life-altering. I finally didn't feel alone," said Anna.

Community support has become a lifeline for so many with chronic illnesses, especially those such as Anna whose conditions are under-recognized or misunderstood by the public and even the medical community.

Anna summed up, "I'm learning to live with it. I want people to know they're not alone. Even with a condition like this, life can still be full."

What is Fowler's Syndrome?

Initially identified in 1985, Fowler's Syndrome is an uncommon etiology of urinary retention in females, generally aged between 20 and 30 years. Fowler's Syndrome affects the urethral sphincter—the muscle that controls the release of urine—making the muscle remain constricted, even when the bladder is full. This leads to a lack of ability to urinate spontaneously.

In contrast to most other causes of urinary retention, Fowler's Syndrome is not associated with neurological disease. It may come on suddenly in some cases with no apparent cause. In others, it may follow surgery or delivery.

Symptoms of Fowler's Syndrome

Symptoms differ from patient to patient. Some may be able to urinate but not completely empty the bladder, while others—such as Anna—are completely retained. With the filling of the bladder, severe pain and frequent infection ensue. Many women experience recurring cystitis, kidney infections, and constant pain.

What Causes Fowler's Syndrome?

To this point, the true cause of Fowler's Syndrome has not been discovered. Scientists are still trying to determine why the urethral sphincter does not relax. Some speculations include hormonal connections, particularly because approximately 50% of patients also suffer from polycystic ovaries, yet no cause has been determined.

The syndrome could develop spontaneously or after surgery—most often gynecological or urological—or after delivery. Without an established cure, symptom management becomes the main priority.

Treatment for Fowler's Syndrome

Treatment of Fowler's Syndrome depends on severity.

Mild Cases: Patients with the ability to urinate partially might only require monitoring to assess residual bladder volume.

Moderate Cases: Those with high residual volumes might need intermittent self-catheterization several times a day to avoid infection and bladder damage.

Severe Cases: In complete retention cases, patients can be considered for sacral nerve stimulation—a treatment involving the use of electrical pulses to stimulate nerves and return bladder function. This is still the only treatment with hope of restoring natural urination in some patients.

Have you or someone you know recently made the switch to e-cigarettes believing they're a better alternative to smoking? With slim packaging, sweet flavors, and less toxins than regular cigarettes, vapes appear to be the smarter choice but new studies are ringing the alarm- e-cigarettes could be causing more damage to your lungs than you think. From free radical damage to heightened risk for COPD, the "safe" image of vaping is rapidly disintegrating.

Over the last decade, vaping has become the new smoking alternative. A large new study conducted by scientists at Johns Hopkins Medicine has implicated sole use of e-cigarettes with permanent damage to the lungs, including development of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Free radicals and toxic chemicals inhaled when vaping that attack lung tissue.

Vaping or Smoking: Is It Really the Lesser of Two Evils?

E-cigarettes or vapes have quickly grown to become the second-most prevalent use of tobacco in America. Middle and high school students alone account for more than a million regular e-cigarette users, based on Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) figures. For adults, user rates increased from 4.5% in 2019 to 6.5% in 2023 — an alarming upward trend.

Unlike cigarettes — which have been thoroughly researched for decades — the long-term effect of vaping is not well understood, especially among older adults. That is, until now.

How E-Cigarettes Harm Your Lungs?

A recent study, released in Nicotine & Tobacco Research and conducted by Dr. Michael Blaha, a professor of cardiology and epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, has completed an important piece of the puzzle. Based on a solid sample of nearly a quarter-million participants between the ages of 30 and 70, the study followed participants over four years to identify the health consequences of different tobacco-use behaviors — including vaping exclusively.

Here's what they discovered: out of 3,164 elite e-cigarette users, there was a statistically significant rise in new cases of COPD and, although to a lesser degree, hypertension. Although these rates were lower than among conventional cigarette smokers, they were greater than among non-smokers — confirming that e-cigarettes are not as harmless as previously believed.

"These findings are an important stepping stone for future studies on the health impact of e-cigarettes," Dr. Blaha said in a news release. "We now have a clear link between e-cigarette use and new-onset COPD that will need to be carefully monitored."

Dangerous Link Between E-Cigarettes and COPD

COPD, a chronic lung disease that limits airflow and gets progressively worse, has traditionally been linked to smoking. Indeed, 8 of every 10 deaths due to COPD in the U.S. are caused by traditional cigarettes. But the new information contradicts the conventional wisdom that e-cigarettes are the safer choice.

Scientists determined that even singleton e-cigarette users experienced an increase in risk for developing COPD — a conclusion which is in line with previous, smaller studies that attributed vaping to asthma and other respiratory illnesses.

Alarming as it is, the harm associated with vaping could be due to exposure to oxidative stress and free radicals — unstable molecules that harm cells and tissues. Free radicals are produced when e-liquids are heated and can cause inflammation and permanent structural damage to the lungs.

Chemicals Behind the Lung Damage

In opposition to common assumption, e-cigarette vapor is not harmless at all. Vape juice regularly includes a combination of nicotine, THC, flavorings, and oily solvents — including agents that can ruin lung tissue:

Vitamin E acetate: Safe as a skin product or food supplement but hazardous when breathed in. It has been found in the lungs of people suffering from severe vaping-related illnesses.

Diacetyl: Added to flavor, this chemical causes "popcorn lung" (bronchiolitis obliterans), a condition that destroys the small airways of the lungs.

Formaldehyde: A poisonous compound that raises the risk of lung disease and heart ailments.

Acrolein: A recognized irritant and herbicide capable of causing acute and chronic lung damage.

The act of vaporizing these compounds in an aerosol ensures that consumers are not only inhaling flavored vapor, but they are subjecting their lungs to a mix of chemicals whose known toxic effects.

A second population identified in the research — those who both use e-cigarettes and regular cigarettes — were determined to be at highest risk for respiratory disease, including COPD. These dual users account for a large segment of current tobacco-users and are subject to compounded health risks.

"Vaping isn't the way out that people believe," cautions Dr. Daniel Ouellette, Henry Ford Health Chief of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine. "We're just beginning to learn how vaping damages lungs across decades, but what we do know already rings alarm bells."

Why are Young Adults Still Drawn to the Vape?

Even with a recent dip in youth vaping and an FDA prohibition on some flavored e-cigarettes, vaping is extremely popular among young adults. In 2023, 15.5% of U.S. adults between the ages of 21–24 vaped frequently, while only 3.3% of adults between the ages of 50–64 did.

This is especially concerning with the growing evidence that early and extended exposure to vaping increases the risk of chronic lung disease later in life.

While vaping was once positioned as a safer bridge away from smoking, the science tells a more sobering story. Free radicals and toxic chemicals present in e-cigarette vapor are not just irritants — they are agents of irreversible lung damage. And with COPD diagnoses rising even among exclusive vapers, it is clear that the risk is real and growing.

Subtle Signs You’re Damaging Your Lungs

Even apart from the massive coughing fit or readily visible signs, your lungs might be strained by vaping already. Study summarized in the *Journal of Clinical Investigation* reports that e-cigarettes release free radicals—molecules too reactive that harm lung tissue on the cellular level. This type of harm often will not necessarily reveal immediate signs but may subtly work its way towards causing long-term inflammation. With time, you may experience shortness of breath on light exertion, tightness in the chest, or mild wheezing—dismissed until the issue gets serious. Such symptoms, while subtle, are early indicators of possible irreversible lung alterations.

What You Can Do to Protect Your Lungs?

Stopping vaping may seem challenging, particularly if it was your initial departure from conventional cigarettes but going on can raise your risk of getting COPD or chronic lung inflammation. Taking charge begins with knowing what triggers you—stress, boredom, or habit—and substituting them with better ones.

Nicotine replacement therapies (such as patches or lozenges), behavioral counseling, or computer-based cessation programs can help overcome cravings. First and foremost, see a health care provider to evaluate your lungs and receive individualized advice. The sooner you act, the more likely you are to reduce damage.