New weapons in the fight against cancer

Currently, we know that the term " cancer " does not refer to a single disease, but covers a group of conditions with different prognoses and treatments. Thanks to the progressive understanding of the molecular biology of cancer, we have evidence that a large number of tumors are formed in different parts of the body (lung, breast, liver, etc.) and may share genetic traits.

In this way, an effective procedure against one type of cancer, can also be used against another. The innovations are taking place quickly and facilitate, in most cases, applying a specific treatment for each patient, oriented to the characteristics of each tumor.

However, improving anti-cancer drugs is a long and expensive procedure. Researchers continually examine new procedures to provide effective treatments that are available to oncologists and their patients.

Medications used for other pathologies also begin to be used for cancer

One of these emerging strategies is the re-evaluation of already accepted drugs for some diseases and their "repositioning" or "re-use" for the treatment of cancer.. This orientation has been possible thanks to discovering that a wide range of different diseases concentrate common genetic origins.

For this reason, drugs effective against specific genetic variations linked to diabetes, angina pectoris or many other characteristics, are now being investigated as potential anti-cancer therapies.. For example, statins are drugs used for cholesterol reduction that also in laboratory experiments have shown potential to inhibit the genetic mutation Rac1, which drives the development of non-microcritical lung cancer and melanoma.

A wide range of drugs qualified in a source as sedatives, antiarthritics, immunosuppressants, cardioprotectors, among many others, in a short period of time, could be used for the treatment of cancer, thus expanding quickly and safely the series of therapeutic options available to doctors and patients.