Will statins help oncologists?
Statins helped to cope with leukemia in mice
Anna Kerman, XX2 century, based on the materials of Medical Xpress: Statins found to enhance the efficacy of chemotherapy drug in blood cancers.
Researchers from the United States have found that some statins can increase the effectiveness of the treatment of mice with venetoclax, a chemotherapeutic drug. In Europe and America, this remedy is used in the treatment of patients suffering from chronic lymphocytic leukemia.
Statins belong to the so-called lipid-lowering drugs, drugs that reduce the concentration of certain fractions of lipids in the blood. As a rule, they are prescribed in order to reduce the indicators of triglycerides and "bad" cholesterol (more precisely, low-density lipoproteins), since these fats are closely associated with the risks of heart attacks and strokes. But the authors of a new study have found that statins can also be useful for patients suffering from some forms of blood cancer.
Previous studies have shown that statins can provoke apoptosis (natural cell death) of tumor cells in certain types of cancer, which means that these drugs can theoretically be used in the treatment of certain oncological diseases. The authors of the new work found that simvastatin significantly increases the effectiveness of venetoclax in the treatment of chronic lymphocytic leukemia in model animals (mice).
As it turned out, the addition of simvastatin to the treatment regimen activated the signaling pathways associated with apoptosis in tumor cells. As a result, experimental animals receiving combination therapy had a longer life expectancy than mice who were given only one of the mentioned drugs.
Encouraged by the results, the researchers turned to the results of earlier clinical trials of venetoclax in patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Scientists, for obvious reasons, were particularly interested in information about patients who received statins in addition to antitumor treatment – to reduce the level of lipids in the blood. It turned out that such patients responded to chemotherapy better than those who did not take statins. It was also found that taking statins simultaneously with antitumor therapy increased the chances of achieving complete remission by 2.7 times.
If statins are as effective in humans [as in mice], the authors of the study believe, their introduction into oncological clinical practice will not take much time. The fact is that statins have already been approved and registered in many countries of the world, millions of people take these drugs daily to reduce the level of low-density lipoproteins. It is also important that statins are well tolerated – there are relatively few side effects associated with taking them. The authors of the work claim that in order to confirm the ability of statins to improve the outcome of treatment of patients with leukemia and other types of blood cancer, it is necessary to conduct clinical trials with the participation of volunteers.
Article by Lee et al. Statins enhance efficacy of venetoclax in blood cancers is published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
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