Doctors can use tumour's assets to help drug intake
An expert has said that doctors can use a cancer's own architecture to help treat it and improve drug delivery to the tumour.
Professor Lisa Coussens, from the University of California San Francisco Medical Center, said it has long been known that different treatments work more effectively with certain types of cancer, such as chemotherapy being more effective on testicular forms of the disease.
The expert has now suggested that doctors use the cancer's own strengths to improve drug delivery. She said that solid tumours need a good blood supply in order to grow, but the blood vessels are disorganised and leaky meaning that drugs can leach into the tumours.
Professor Coussens said that the high tissue pressure inside the tumours prevents drug uptake and so causes a barrier to treatment. However, the expert stated that the balance can be tipped to block the action of a signalling molecule , making blood vessels more leaky.
According to the report "this window of leakiness can be used to 'open up' the tumor for more efficient delivery of drugs".
"Blocking the ALK5 pathway may not only make chemotherapy far more effective in multiple cancers, but could also aid in efficient delivery of the many other therapies that rely on the bloodstream to carry them into a tumour," it added.
The effectiveness of breast cancer drugs has also been examined lately, with research from Indiana University Bloomington scientists showing that it could depend on the body producing two key proteins. They looked at Fulvestrant, which appears to work at its best when cells produce normal or higher levels of cytokeratins CK8 and CK18.
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Posted by Stephen Tate 
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