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The thymus decides how healthy you stayThe “forgotten organ” – researchers discover that it determines our age
The thymus sits directly behind your breastbone
dpa
Doctors thought the thymus was unimportant for adults!
But a new study now suggests that this small, lobe-shaped organ can determine whether cancer treatments work for us and whether we can grow old healthily.
The thymus – the “forgotten organ”
We think that scientists should know our bodies pretty well by now – and then this. Researchers at Mass General Brigham, a medical institution that is part of Harvard University, took another closer look at this small double lobe and discovered something amazing. Doctors actually thought that the thymus in our chest is only active in children and teaches the white blood cells how to fight infections.
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“The thymus has been neglected for decades and may be a missing piece of the puzzle to explain why people age differently and why cancer treatments fail in some patients,” explains Hugo Aerts, one of the authors of the studies.
Data from more than 25,000 patients have shown that people with a well-functioning thymus have a 63 percent lower risk of dying from heart disease, are 36 percent less likely to develop lung cancer and can halve their risk of death in the coming years. However, the following insight was particularly important: If you have a healthy thymus, cancer therapies work significantly betterr on. The probability of survival increases by up to 44 percent.
The thymus is our training camp
But why is that? To put it simply, scientists have discovered that the thymus does not stop training the immune system when we grow up. In it, the white blood cells are specially prepared for certain viruses and bacteria, like in a boot camp. If you have successfully completed this camp, your body will be better prepared. And that also helps enormously with cancer therapies.
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“Better understanding and monitoring of thymus health could ultimately help doctors better assess disease risk and make treatment decisions more targeted,” says study author Aerts. Und what do scientists advise us to keep the thymus as healthy as possible? We should definitely not smoke and we should pay attention to our diet. Because excess weight is the enemy of the thymus. So we can help him help us! (tbe)
vSources used: Mace General Brigham, Nature
