Drug kills cancer stem cells

steved said:

Thioridazine
This is an antipsychotic I prescribed for years as a psychiatrist but was withdrawn a few years back because of teh accumulating evidence of a link to arrythmias in the heart. My sense was it was very safe for the vast majority and was often used for anxious people who weren't psychotic for its generally calming properties. We now have safer antipsychotics and its use in psychiatry isn't justified but in a field like oncology there is a greater tolerance of potential side effects if drugs are found to be effective because of teh severity of the illnesses that are being treated.

I am not aware of any particular link between dopamine and colorectal cancer however (it is a dopamine blocking drug) so is unlikely to be useful for us but in breast cancer and leaukemias it may have a role.

steve

John23 said:

Intuition

Re:
"well it may kill others but if they already have cancer what a few
more life altering and leathal opportunities to ruin those peoples life.. "

That's what our TCM doc has always said!

No-one can predict our mortality; no-one can determine when
our life will end (unless they're the ones that are going to end it).

So why does anyone take medications that will do harm, thinking
that they are going to die anyway?

Anyone that worries about taking any medication or food product,
or tobacco product.... or holding a cellphone too close to one's head
during a call, should realize that the very same chemicals that are
being taken to resolve cancer, are all carcinogenic and can cause death.

We have to weigh the good vs the bad, and -not- allow the fear of
"not taking a conventional remedy" to rule us.

If our instincts tell us to avoid something, it's usually best to follow
those instincts. Looking back after taking damaging chemicals and
wishing we took a different route, is worse than not having taken
that route at all.

We all have the benefit of having received the gift of self-preservation;
it's the gift of an inner intuition that tells us right from wrong.

We really should listen to it more often!

Best of health to all,

John

smokeyjoe said:

I found this on line
I found this on line pubmed...Abstract
PURPOSE: Because neurotransmitter dopamine inhibits vascular permeability factor/vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF)-induced angiogenesis and as anti-VEGF agents act synergistically with anticancer drugs, we therefore investigated whether dopamine can increase the efficacies of these drugs.

EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: The effect of dopamine was investigated in human breast cancer-(MCF-7) and colon (HT29) cancer-bearing mice. Experimental groups received either dopamine or doxorubicin or dopamine plus doxorubicin in MCF-7 tumor-bearing mice, and either dopamine or 5-fluorouracil or dopamine plus 5-fluorouracil in HT29-bearing mice. Thereafter, tumor growth, angiogenesis, tumor cell apoptosis, life span, and the effect of dopamine on the growth and survival of tumor cells in vitro were determined. Finally, the effects of dopamine on tumor vascular permeability; on VEGF receptor-2, mitogen-activated protein kinase, and focal adhesion kinase phosphorylation; and also on the proliferation and migration of tumor endothelial cells were investigated.

RESULTS: Dopamine, in combination with anticancer drugs, significantly inhibited tumor growth and increased the life span when compared with treatment with dopamine or anticancer drugs alone. Dopamine had no direct effects on the growth and survival of tumor cells. The antiangiogenic action of dopamine was mediated by inhibiting proliferation and migration of tumor endothelial cells through suppression of VEGF receptor-2, mitogen-activated protein kinase, and focal adhesion kinase phosphorylation.

CONCLUSION: Our study shows that dopamine significantly enhances the efficacies of commonly used anticancer drugs and also indicates that an inexpensive drug like dopamine, which is being extensively used in the clinics, might have a role as an antiangiogenic agent for the treatment of breast and colon cancer.

smokeyjoe said:

Hey Marie, I'll see if I
Hey Marie, I'll see if I can find it again....if my memory serves me right it was like in 2008 from what I read...I'm surprised when I attached it that it didn't have that.....but I found it interesting as it seemed to be totally opposite effect that they are stating in the McMaster studies....I shall search what I did and repost for you....I was hoping our resident psych. would have some more comments...Expand+Clinical Cancer Researchclincancerres.aacrjournals.orgdoi: 10.1158/1078-0432.CCR-07-1778 Clin Cancer Res April 15, 2008 14; 2502
Dopamine Increases the Efficacy of Anticancer Drugs in Breast and Colon Cancer Preclinical Models
Chandrani Sarkar1,3, Debanjan Chakroborty1,3, Uttio Roy Chowdhury1, Partha Sarathi Dasgupta1 and Sujit Basu2,3,4
+ Author Affiliations

Authors' Affiliations:1Signal Transduction and Biogenic Amines Laboratory and 2Department of Medical Oncology, Chittaranjan National Cancer Institute, Kolkata, India; and 3Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and 4Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota
Requests for reprints:
Partha Sarathi Dasgupta, Signal Transduction and Biogenic Amines Laboratory, Chittaranjan National Cancer Institute, 37 S.P. Mukherjee Road, Kolkata 700026, India. Phone: 91-33-24765101, ext. 324; E-mail: partha42002@yahoo.com or Sujit Basu, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and Cancer Center, Mayo Clinic, Gugg 1793, 200 First Street Southwest, Rochester, MN 55905. Phone: 507-284-1344; E-mail: basu.sujit@mayo.edu.
Abstract
Purpose: Because neurotransmitter dopamine inhibits vascular permeability factor/vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF)–induced angiogenesis and as anti-VEGF agents act synergistically with anticancer drugs, we therefore investigated whether dopamine can increase the efficacies of these drugs.

Experimental Design: The effect of dopamine was investigated in human breast cancer–(MCF-7) and colon (HT29) cancer–bearing mice. Experimental groups received either dopamine or doxorubicin or dopamine plus doxorubicin in MCF-7 tumor-bearing mice, and either dopamine or 5-fluorouracil or dopamine plus 5-fluorouracil in HT29-bearing mice. Thereafter, tumor growth, angiogenesis, tumor cell apoptosis, life span, and the effect of dopamine on the growth and survival of tumor cells in vitro were determined. Finally, the effects of dopamine on tumor vascular permeability; on VEGF receptor-2, mitogen-activated protein kinase, and focal adhesion kinase phosphorylation; and also on the proliferation and migration of tumor endothelial cells were investigated.

Results: Dopamine, in combination with anticancer drugs, significantly inhibited tumor growth and increased the life span when compared with treatment with dopamine or anticancer drugs alone. Dopamine had no direct effects on the growth and survival of tumor cells. The antiangiogenic action of dopamine was mediated by inhibiting proliferation and migration of tumor endothelial cells through suppression of VEGF receptor-2, mitogen-activated protein kinase, and focal adhesion kinase phosphorylation. K...Marie here you go....hope you can make sense of it....I'm blonde, that's my excuse....