Current Cancer Therapy Reviews - Volume 17, Issue 3, 2021

Cancer is a genetic disease triggered by gene mutations, which control cell growth and their functionality inherited from previous generations. The targeted therapy of some tumors was not especially successful. A host of new techniques can be used to treat aptamer-mediated targeting, cancer immunotherapy, cancer stem cell (CSC) therapy, cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs), hormone therapy, intracellular cancer cell targeting, nanoparticles, and viral therapy. These include chemical-analog conjugation, gene delivery, ligand-receptor-based targeting, prodrug therapies, and triggered release strategies. Virotherapy is a biotechnological technique for turning viruses into therapeutic agents by the reprogramming of viruses to cure diseases. In several tumors, including melanoma, multiple myeloma, bladder cancer, and breast cancer, the oncolytic capacity of oncolytic Coxsackievirus has been studied. The present study aims to assess oncolytic Coxsackievirus and its mechanisms of effect on cancer cells.

Breast cancer is the most common type of malignancy among ladies (around 30% of newly diagnosed patients every year). To date, various modern treatment modalities for breast cancer, such as radiotherapy, surgical method, hormonal therapy, and chemotherapeutic drug utilisation, are available. However, adverse drug reactions, therapeutic resistance, metastasis, or cancer reoccurrence chances remain the primary causes of mortality for breast cancer patients. To overcome all the potential drawbacks, we need to investigate novel techniques and strategies that are not considered previously to treat breast cancer effectively with safety and efficacy. For centuries, we utilise phytochemicals to treat various diseases because of their safety, low-cost, and least or no side effects. Recently, naturally produced phytochemicals gain immense attention as potential breast cancer therapeutics because of their ideal characteristics; for instance, they operate via modulating molecular pathways associated with cancer growth and progression. The primary mechanism involves inhibition of cell proliferation, angiogenesis, migration, invasion, increasing anti-oxidant status, initiation of the arrest of the cell cycle, and apoptosis. Remedial viability gets effectively enhanced when phytochemicals work as adjuvants with chemotherapeutic drugs. This comprehensive review revolves around the latest chemopreventive, chemotherapeutic, and chemoprotective treatments with their molecular mechanisms to treat breast cancer by utilising phytochemicals such as vinca alkaloids, resveratrol, curcumin, paclitaxel, silibinin, quercetin, genistein, and epigallocatechin gallate. The authors wish to extend the field of phytochemical study for its scientific validity and its druggability.

Introduction: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most common type of liver cancer that has increased in recent years worldwide. Primary liver cancer or HCC is considered the 5th and 7th most common cancer among men and women, respectively. It is also the second leading cause of cancer death worldwide. Unfortunately, HCC is frequently diagnosed at an advanced stage when the majority of the patients do not have access to remedial therapies. Furthermore, current systemic chemotherapy shows low efficacy and minimum survival benefits. Liver cancer therapy is a multidisciplinary, multiple-choice treatment based on the complex interaction of the tumour stage, the degree of liver disease, and the patient's general state of health. Methods: In this paper, we reviewed new insights into nonsurgical and surgical treatment of liver cancer in five English databases, including Scopus, PubMed, Web of Science, EMBASE, and Google Scholar up to December 2019. Results: The results demonstrated, in addition to current therapies such as chemotherapy and surgical resection, new approaches, including immunotherapy, viral therapy, gene therapy, new ablation therapies, and adjuvant therapy, are widely used for the treatment of HCC. In recent years, biomaterials such as nanoparticles, liposomes, microspheres, and nanofibers are also regarded as reliable and innovative patents for the treatment and study of liver cancers. Conclusion: Multidisciplinary and multi-choice treatments and therapies are available for this liver cancer, while there are differences in liver cancer management recommendations among specialties and geographic areas. Current results have shown that treatment strategies have been combined with the advancement of novel treatment modalities. In addition, the use of new approaches with greater efficacy, such as combination therapy, biomaterials, ablation therapy, etc. can be considered the preferred treatment for patients.

Today, despite significant advances in cancer treatment have been made, breast cancer remains one of the main health problems and considered a top biomedical investigation urgency. The present study reviewed the common conventional chemotherapy agents and also some alternative and complementary approaches such as oncolytic virotherapy, bacteriotherapy, nanotherapy, immunotherapy, and natural products, which are recommended for breast cancer treatment. In addition to current surgery approaches such as mastectomy, in recent years, a number of novel techniques such as robotic mastectomies, nipple-sparing mastectomy, skin-sparing mastectomy, daycase mastectomy were used in breast cancer surgery. In this review, we summarize new insights into risk factors, surgical and non-surgical treatments for breast cancer.

Background: Due to the increasing prevalence of cancer and the inadequacy of current therapies, the development of novel antitumor pharmaceutics with higher efficacies and lower adverse effects is considered a fundamental tenet of contemporary cancer management. Poly-Ethylene-Glycol (PEG) attachment is a novel pharmaceutical technology to improve the efficacy and safety of chemotherapies. Etirinotecan Pegol (EP), also known as NKTR-102, is the PEGylated form of Irinotecan (CPT-11), which causes cancer cell apoptosis by inhibiting the topoisomerase I enzyme. Objective: The present study reviews and evaluates various reports of the EP’s anti-tumor activity in various cancers. Data Source: Studies were identified using the Scopus database, with no exclusions. The search terms included Etirinotecan Pegol and NKTR-102, which yielded 125 articles (66 and 59 articles, respectively). In addition, the clinicaltrials.gov website was used to find ongoing studies, which resulted in the addition of two studies. Study Eligibility Criteria: Subsequently, we excluded studies that were published in languages other than English, duplicate articles, and studies with no data. Results: This systematic review clarifies that EP possesses numerous advantages over many other medications, such as safety, efficacy, increased half-life, increased health-related quality of life, increased overall survival, increased progression-free survival, and decreasing the adverse events in the treatment of various cancers. Conclusion: Therefore, Etirinotecan Pegol may represent a major contribution to the treatment of various cancers in the future.

Aim: The aim of this study was to determine tumor characteristics and outcomes of patients with rectal cancer <40 years old compared to those above that age at a single institution in Lebanon. Background: The incidence of colorectal cancer is increasing in younger adults as observed from limited available data from the Middle East. Objective: Overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) were estimated using Kaplan- Meier. Methods: We conducted a retrospective study of patients who were diagnosed with rectal cancer over 15 years. Data were collected regarding demographics, stage, pathology, treatment, and outcomes. Patients were stratified by age, with 40 years as cut-off. Descriptive statistics were conducted. Results: Data for 105 cases were reviewed, 18 patients were aged under 40 years old and 87 patients were above 40 years old. Younger patients had more poorly differentiated tumors than older patients and were more likely to have tumors with signet-ring features. 5-year DFS was 35% and 51.5% for patients below and above 40 years old, respectively (P=0.04). OS was similar in the two age groups, with a median follow-up of 36 months. Conclusion: Further prospective studies with larger sample size and molecular markers are needed to better understand the characteristics of rectal cancer in the young age group. With worse DFS in our study and emerging evidence of a correlation between younger age at diagnosis and poor outcomes, consideration should be given to more personalized upfront intensification of treatment in the young.

Background: The effects of chemotherapeutics agents are considered to influence the immune system and cells due to their myelosuppressive and immunosuppressive functions. Natural killer cells are one of the important components of the innate immune system and have a critical role against tumor cells and infections. Objective: The study was aimed to demonstrate whether conventional chemotherapies had an effect on Natural Killer (NK) cell activity. Methods: Forty-nine adjuvant and 19 first-time metastatic chemotherapy-naïve cancer patients were recruited into the study. Blood samples at pre-chemotherapy and post-chemotherapy, at 1st and 4th cycles, were obtained for NK cell activity. Results: We found no difference between baseline and post-chemotherapy NK cell activity levels. In addition, we found no difference between pre-chemotherapy and post-chemotherapy NK cell activity in both adjuvant and metastatic cancer patients separately. Conclusion: Conventional chemotherapy seems to have no effect on NK cell activity levels in cancer patients in both metastatic and adjuvant settings.