Mesothelioma Drug Therapy (including chemotherapy)
Chemotherapy uses medicines, drugs and chemicals as a way to kill cancer cells. For mesothelioma patients, the results of chemotherapy have been mixed, yet there is now cause for hope as new drugs are discovered and made available.
Chemotherapy may be used in combination with surgery to slow mesothelioma tumor growth. It is also used alone in more advanced mesothelioma cases when surgery is inappropriate.
Pemetrexed is the first chemotherapy drug approved to specifically treat pleural mesothelioma. It has prolonged patients’ survival and improved the quality of their lives. New drugs such as raltitrexed and ranpirnase are still in the experimental stage.
Chemotherapy agents used in malignant mesothelioma treatment:
Adriamycin (Doxorubicin) – This agent has been used for a number of years against a range of cancers.
Aroplatin (L-NDDP) – less toxic than more traditional chemotherapy drugs
Carboplatin – This chemotherapy agent is used primarily for ovarian and lung cancer.
Cisplatin – A platinum-containing chemotherapy agent that is used to treat various forms of cancer, including metastatic disease. It is frequently combined with newer drugs to increase effectiveness.
Cyclophosphamide (Endoxana®) – A chemotherapy treatment used in various forms of cancer.
Edatrexate – Another drug which is more effective used in combination with cisplatin.
Endostatin – Reduces the growth of blood vessels, to starve the tumor.
Gemcitabine – Inhibits the growth of cancer cells, which are eventually destroyed.
Methotrexate – This agent works by limiting cell growth. It is used for treatment of other diseases as well as cancer.
Mitomycin – One of the older chemotherapy drugs, used on many forms of cancer.
Vinorelbine (Navelbine®) – single agent or in combination with cisplatin for the first-line treatment of ambulatory patients with unresectable, advanced non-small cell lung cancer.
Onconase® (Ranpirnase) – is a novel anti-cancer drug, in patients with unresectable or inoperable malignant mesothelioma.
Pemetrexed (Alimta®) – Alimta is the first drug to be approved specifically for malignant mesothelioma. It had about the same effectiveness of Taxotere in trials, but the side effects were much less severe.
Trimetrexate – Used in conjunction with luecovorin to treat pneumonia in patients with impaired immune systems (like cancer patients.)
Taxol® (Paclitaxel) – is given prior to Cisplatin/Carboplatin to decrease the incidence of severe neutropenia.
Zofran® (Ondansetron Hydrochloride) – is for the prevention of nausea and vomiting associated with single-day highly emetogenic cancer chemotherapy in adults.
Heat can also improve the efficacy of locally administered chemotherapy agents. One method (Interoperative Hyperthermic Peritoneal Perfusion, or IHPP) uses a heated chemotherapy solution to irrigate the abdomen after surgery for peritoneal mesothelioma, to kill any malignancy left behind if the entire tumor is removed, or to slow the growth of any inoperable tumor or relieve symptoms in advanced stages of the disease.
Therapeutic drugs have been used to treat thousands of illnesses throughout human history. The earliest forms were herbal treatments used to relieve minor pain and suffering. For centuries, Indians in South America chewed the bark of the cinchona plant to reduce swelling and fevers. Later on it was discovered that chemicals in the bark prevented malaria, which hasted the development of the drug quinine. Modern advances in chemistry and medicine have taken this ancient practice and applied to the science of treating cancer, called oncology.
