Tumor Drug Seen Helping Battle Cancer

An experimental drug that cuts off a tumor’s blood supply showed promising results on patients with advanced colorectal cancer when paired with chemotherapy in a UCLA study, it was announced Thursday.

“This study could give us a less toxic and a more effective weapon in our growing arsenal of cancer therapies,” said Dr. Fairooz Kabbinavar of UCLA’s Jonsson Cancer Center, lead author of the study.

Because a tumor cannot grow bigger than a pinhead unless it gets an independent blood supply, researchers believe that by keeping the tumor from getting new blood they can kill it off. The process tumors use to get an independent blood supply is called angiogenesis.

By giving patients the angiogenesis inhibitor Avastin and also giving them two chemotherapy drugs, researchers hoped to see the two treatment methods work better by complementing each other, according to UCLA.

The study involved 104 patients with advanced colorectal cancer. Among those who received both types of drugs, drug treatment was more effective in shrinking tumors and patients lived longer and went longer without their cancer growing again after treatment.