Possible New Cancer Treatment

Antifungal Drug Stops Blood Vessel Growth

Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered to their surprise that a drug commonly used to treat toenail fungus can also block angiogenesis, the growth of new blood vessels commonly seen in cancers. The drug, itraconazole, already is FDA approved which may fast-track it for use as an antiangiogenesis drug.

The researchers worked with cells from human umbilical cords, a rich source of blood vessels, and exposed them to 2,400 existing drugs - including FDA- and foreign-approved drugs that had passed safety trials - to see which ones could stop the cells from dividing.

PROSTATE CANCER PATIENT SUPPORT 1 800 80 Us TOO

"The best outcome was to find an already approved drug that worked, and the fact that we did was very satisfying," says Doctor Liu, whose study appears online in ACS Chemical Biology.

"Our screening test did show that cholesterol-lowering statins also appear to stop blood vessel growth," Liu says, "so there is likely some important connection between cholesterol and angiogenesis."

While the researchers still must tease out exactly how itraconazole works to stop vessel growth, and test it in animals with cancer, they have high hopes for its use.

Science Daily, 27 April 11, 2007

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