Mesothelioma Cancer Victims Might Find Hope from Genetic Therapy Clinical Trials
Cancer doctors choose what type of treatment to go with to a patient. There are many options. There are no standard treatment course for pleural mesothelioma cancer patients. This is because of the relative rareness of the disease, the high mortality rate and low treatment success rate, and the few scientific studies to provide meaningful statistics.
The prospects for mesothelioma patients have been grim, but doctors have recently made progress. Traditional treatments for cancer are surgery (removing the tumor and surrounding tissue), radiation (killing the cancerous cells with radiation), and chemotherapy (poisoning the cancerous cells.) All three methods have problems. Mesothelioma patients treated with traditional radiation therapy have not responded well to it. Researches, concerned about damage to healthy tissue, are looking for ways to aim radiation directly at tumors.
Surgery takes out the mesothelial cancerous tissue around the tumor. The surgery is difficult and challenging, with unknown effects or benefits to patients. The usual chemotherapy cocktails effective on other cancers are not effective on mesothelioma, and different combinations of chemotherapy drugs have been tried without a lot of success. As with radiation, research is going toward controlling the physical location of the treatment with emphasis on the pleural cavity.
The high-mortality rate for mesothelioma patients means cutting-edge techniques for cancer are tried out. These include biologic therapy such as the agent interleukin 2 and anti-angiogenesis drugs such as thalidomide. The new drug pemetrexed (brand name Alimta) has shown good results in extending life with mesotheliomas..
Before acting, oncologists review the stage of mesothelioma, position of the tumor, and age and health status of the patient. Two therapies that are extremely cutting-edge in fighting cancer are called photodynamic and gene therapy. Patients afflicted with mesothelioma are benefitting in these clinical trials.
