A DOCTOR鈥橲 note might be needed by cancer patients who want to enter the US but whose fingerprints have become unreadable due to the side effects of a common cancer drug.
The warning comes from oncologists in Singapore, who have found that one of their patients was detained by US when he tried to visit his relatives, all because of a side-effect of a drug called .
Capecitabine is used to treat cancers including those of the colon and breast. It is also used against nasopharyngeal cancer, when it seems to work best in people who are also strongly affected by a side-effect in which the skin on the hands and feet becomes inflamed and can peel off.
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In the Annals of Oncology () oncologists led by Eng-Huat Tan of the , Singapore, describe a 62-year-old man with nasopharyngeal cancer who was responding well to capecitabine. Because prints from his index fingers could not be read by the reader installed at a US airport, officers held him for four hours while they ran background checks.
People with severely abraded hands, such as bricklayers, may be similarly delayed, says , a specialist in biometrics at Michigan State University in East Lansing. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a nuisance, but it鈥檚 the price you鈥檙e paying for security,鈥� he says.