Combination of Paclitaxel, Sorafenib, and Radiation in Advanced Breast Cancer
Posted: Friday, January 11, 2019
The combination of paclitaxel, sorafenib, and radiation treatment for patients with advanced breast cancer synergistically decreased the viability of cancer cells and significantly induced apoptosis, according to preclinical study findings published in Translational Oncology. The study, conducted by Kyung Hwa Choi, MD, of CHA University in South Korea, and colleagues, suggests that the combination of the three treatments may prove to be more effective than cotreatment with paclitaxel or sorafenib and radiation therapy in patients with breast cancer and in those with renal cell carcinoma.
“This result proposes a novel clinical approach that targets [renal cell carcinoma] and breast cancer with low-dose anticancer drugs in combination with [radiation treatment], which would reduce the toxic side effects of anticancer treatments,” the authors concluded.
The investigators obtained Caki-1 and MDA-MB-231 cells from the American Type Culture Collection. The cells were authenticated using short tandem repeat profiling, karyotyping, and isoenzyme analysis. For the study, breast cancer cells were exposed to paclitaxel and sorafenib alone or combined with the presence of radiation. Cell viability was determined using the 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide assay.
Cotreatment with paclitaxel and sorafenib with radiation therapy significantly decreased the sub-G0/G1 phase of cells (54.1 ± 0.02) more than radiation therapy alone (4.5 ± 0.01) or paclitaxel and sorafenib alone with radiation therapy (27.8 ± 0.01 and 18.9 ± 0.03, respectively). Cleaved-caspase 3 expression levels were increased significantly, indicating cell apoptosis.
Disclosure: The study authors reported no conflicts of interest.
