The blue tablet has the potential to be used as a treatment for rare cancers

The class of drugs currently prescribed to treat male erectile dysfunction has been flagged for its potential to be included in new trials for anti-cancer drugs, in a new clinical study published today in the open access journal, the paper also explores the issue that finding new agents able to cross the blood-brain-barrier is a challenge which severely limits the range of drugs available to treat brain tumors. There is some evidence that drugs not currently licensed for cancer treatment like the PDE5 inhibitors, are able to increase permeability so that drug delivery to brain tumors is improved - thereby potentially opening the door to new therapeutic options for patients.

The paper includes a broad range of data, pre-clinical and clinical, has been summarized and presented to make the case that these commercially available and widely used PDE5 inhibitors are very strong candidates for repurposing as anticancer agents. A number of small, early phase trials are on at present. These trials are largely based on to the strong level of clinical evidence in a number of specific indications and it is to be hoped that positive reports from these trials will be forthcoming in the future. The data are strongest for clinical trials of PDE5 inhibitors, in combination with other agents, in the following cancer types:

(a) HNSCC

(b) Glioblastoma

(c) Pancreatic cancer

(d) Medulloblastoma

(e) Waldenstrom’s macroglobulinemia

(f) Melanoma

https://ecancer.org/journal/12/full/824-repurposing-drugs-in-oncology-redo-selective-pde5-inhibitors-as-anti-cancer-agents.php

How Cancer Arises?

Cancer is a genetic disease—that is, it is caused by changes to genes that control the way our cells function, especially how they grow and divide.

Genetic changes that cause cancer can be inherited from our parents. They can also arise during a person’s lifetime as a result of errors that occur as cells divide or because of damage to DNA caused by certain environmental exposures. Cancer-causing environmental exposures include substances, such as the chemicals in tobacco smoke, and radiation, such as ultraviolet rays from the sun.

Each person’s cancer has a unique combination of genetic changes. As the cancer continues to grow, additional changes will occur. Even within the same tumor, different cells may have different genetic changes. In general, cancer cells have more genetic changes, such as mutations in DNA, than normal cells. Some of these changes may have nothing to do with the cancer; they may be the result of the cancer, rather than its cause.

The genetic changes that contribute to cancer tend to affect three main types of genes—proto-oncogenes, tumor suppressor genes, and DNA repair genes. These changes are sometimes called “drivers” of cancer.

Proto-oncogenes are involved in normal cell growth and division. However, when these genes are altered in certain ways or are more active than normal, they may become cancer-causing genes (or oncogenes), allowing cells to grow and survive when they should not.

Tumor suppressor genes are also involved in controlling cell growth and division. Cells with certain alterations in tumor suppressor genes may divide in an uncontrolled manner.

DNA repair genes are involved in fixing damaged DNA. Cells with mutations in these genes tend to develop additional mutations in other genes. Together, these mutations may cause the cells to become cancerous.

As scientists have learned more about the molecular changes that lead to cancer, they have found that certain mutations commonly occur in many types of cancer. Because of this, cancers are sometimes characterized by the types of genetic alterations that are believed to be driving them, not just by where they develop in the body and how the cancer cells look under the microscope.

Source: https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/understanding/what-is-cancer

Check out my last publicacion about nivolumab and advanced hepatocellular carcinoma
http://www.lupinepublishers.com/oajom/abstracts/OAJOM.MS.ID.000109.php

Brief history about cancer

Cancer is the second leading cause of death in the world after cardiovascular diseases. Half of men and one third of women in the United States will develop cancer during their lifetimes. Today, millions of cancer people extend their life due to early identification and treatment. Cancer is not a new disease and has afflicted people throughout the world. The word cancer came from a Greek words karkinos to describe carcinoma tumors by a physician Hippocrates (460–370 B.C), but he was not the first to discover this disease. Some of the earliest evidence of human bone cancer was found in mummies in ancient Egypt and in ancient manuscripts dates about 1600 B.C. The world’s oldest recorded case of breast cancer hails from ancient Egypt in 2500 -3000BC and it was recorded that there was no treatment for the cancer, only palliative treatment. The details were recorded on a papyrus, documenting 8 cases of tumors occurring in the breast. It was treated by cauterization, a method to destroy tissue with a hot instrument called “the fire drill”. There is evidence that the ancient Egyptians were able to tell the differences between malignant and benign tumors. According to inscriptions, surface tumors were surgically removed in a similar manner as they are removed today.

Check it out how may looks like a deadly melanoma on the skin. Melanoma can be cured if it's found and treated early!

Side effect caused by the new immunotheraphies: Hypopigmented Skin Lesions

New immunotherapies such as immune checkpoint inhibitors: anti-CTLA4, anti–PD-1 and anti-PD-L1 monoclonal antibodies are emerging as standard treatments in various malignant diseases.

The list of current indications is likely to expand as these immunotherapies are tested with promising results in many cancer types. Immunotherapies have a unique pattern of toxic effects similar to autoimmune symptoms called immune-related adverse events (irAEs).Vitiligo is an acquired pigmentary disorder characterized by hypopigmented macules caused by autoimmune destruction of melanocytes. In patients with melanoma, vitiligo-like symptoms can occur as an irAE in between 3.4% and 25% of patients during treatment with an immune checkpoint inhibitor