Last year, MesotheliomaHelp reported on the promising results a drug approved for the treatment of pinworm by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration showed when used in treating brain cancer. Encouraged by those results, another team of researchers turned to determining whether mesothelioma cells would also respond. The team reports that early study results show another parasitic drug could “effectively impair both mesothelioma cell growth and migration.”
Researchers from the University of Siena, Italy turned to the anthelmintic drug pyrvinium pamoate, approved by the Italian Food and Drug Administration to treat infections with parasitic worms, but known for its anti-cancer effects, to determine its effectiveness against mesothelioma, according to a March 7 article from Sbarro Health Research Organization. Comparable to the drug mebendazole, demonstrated effective in brain cancer, the lab results showed at the molecular level the drug interfered with mesothelioma‘s aggressiveness and its resistance to anti-cancer drugs.
“The results of this study represent a step forward in the development of new treatments for patients with mesothelioma, ” said lead researcher Dr. Antonio Giordano at the Sbarro Institute for Cancer Research and Molecular Medicine, Temple University.
In another study this year from Iran, researchers also looked closer at pyrvinium to assess its properties in inhibiting tumor cell spread in cancer models, including lung cancer, and concluded, “The overwhelming insights into the mechanism of anticancer properties of PP [pyrvinium pamoate ]can help in establishing novel and future anti-tumor treatment strategies.”
Mesothelioma, a rare form of cancer, caused by past asbestos exposure, typically affecting the lining of the lungs, is highly aggressive and is resistant to many cancer treatments making it a difficult disease to treat effectively. The prognosis for mesothelioma patients is usually grim: the average survival time varies from 4 – 18 months after diagnosis. Ongoing research to find an effective treatment is critical for increasing survival in patients.
Although the study is still in the lab stage, the researchers are hopeful that with continued positive results bringing the drug to patients will be quicker than normal due to repurposing of the drug rather than having to go through a new drug approval process. Drugs already approved by the FDA can bypass much of the approval process.
“Pyrvinium pamoate is able to affect important features of mesothelioma aggressiveness, suggesting that the repurposing of this drug for mesothelioma treatment could represent a new promising therapeutic approach,” said Dr. Antonio Giordano.
Nearly 3,000 Americans are diagnosed with mesothelioma each year with close to the same number dying from the disease. No new treatments have been approved in the U.S. in nearly 10 years, but any breakthrough from ongoing research brings hope to the mesothelioma community.
The post Drug Used In The Treatment of Pinworm Shows Promise For Stopping Mesothelioma Growth appeared first on MesotheliomaHelp.org Cancer Organization.
from Blog – MesotheliomaHelp.org Cancer Organization https://ift.tt/2ExiNea
via IFTTT
No comments: