Going toe-to-toe with cancer, especially pancreatic cancer, is never easy. Pancreatic cancer is inherently difficult to treat. But a new treatment, now in clinical trials at BC Cancer, has the potential to be a heavy hitter when combined with existing therapies.
Developed by distinguished BC Cancer scientist Dr. Shoukat Dedhar, this treatment method doesn’t work on the tumours themselves, but rather the microenvironment that allows them to thrive.
Shoukat Dedhar, professor in the department of biochemistry and molecular biology
As cancers advance and grow within the body, they adapt from feeding on oxygen to feeding on glucose, meaning their immediate surroundings are hypoxic – or free from oxygen. It’s here that Dedhar and his team found a tumour’s vulnerability. They’ve developed a treatment that targets a protein that is exclusively produced by tumor cells in a hypoxic environment.
By combining this treatment with existing therapies, including chemotherapy or immunotherapy, tumours receive a one-two punch that is found, in pre-clinical models, to be more effective than treating with chemotherapy or immunotherapy alone.
“These are very promising results, not just for pancreatic cancers but we’ve also found that advanced melanoma and certain types of advanced breast cancers have been responsive to this treatment,” said Dedhar, a professor in biochemistry and molecular biology in UBC’s faculty of medicine. “When cancers are more advanced, they are inherently more difficult to treat because they are resistant to our current treatment methods. This combination treatment has the potential of bringing new hope to patients with advanced cancers who are finding their treatments ineffective.”
This combination treatment has the potential of bringing new hope to patients with advanced cancers who are finding their treatments ineffective.
Shoukat Dedhar
distinguished scientist, BC Cancer
Dedhar’s findings have recently been published in Gastroenterology and Cancer Immunology Research.