Local Researchers Use Toenails, Ponytails To Better Understand Cancer

BOSTON (CBS) - Some seemingly unusual human samples are being stored in the basement of Brigham and Women's Hospital: toenails and ponytails. Dr. Mallika Marshall explains why.

Believe it or not, toenails and ponytails hold the keys to understanding certain diseases in humans.

At the Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Cohorts Biorepository, more than 3.5 million human specimens are being stored - not only blood and urine samples, but also toenail clippings from nearly 100,000 people and ponytail locks from hundreds of women.

Blood and urine just reflect a moment in time, but hair and toenails can store information about a patient for up to a year.

Shelley Tworoger, PhD is using these toenail and hair samples to measure stress hormones to better understand the progression of ovarian cancer.

"We know that chronic stress may be an important factor in the development of many chronic diseases," says Tworoger, "So we're very interested in measuring stress hormones that reflect long exposure to stress to better understand how stress affects development of disease such as cancer or heart disease."

Ponytail and toenail samples are still being collected as part of the long-term Nurses' Health Study.