 |
 |
|
The antiepileptic drug
phenytoin reduces tumour growth and
metastasis in a preclinical model of breast cancer
We
and others have found that voltage-gated sodium channels, normally
present in neurons and muscle cells, are up-regulated in metastatic
breast cancer cells. Sodium channels appear to regulate the
behaviour of these cancer cells, helping them to migrate and invade
out of the primary tumour. This suggests that sodium channels might be
useful new therapeutic targets for drugs that could slow
metastasis. Sodium channels are important drug targets for
treating epilepsy. We have found that the antiepileptic drug phenytoin,
which is a sodium channel blocker, reduces tumour growth and
metastasis in a preclinical model of breast cancer. We found that
phenytoin reduces proliferation of cancer cells within the primary
tumour. It also reduces local invasion of cancer cells into the
surrounding fat and muscle, and reduces the number of cells metastasising
to distant sites in the liver, lungs and spleen. This is the
first study to show that phenytoin reduces both the growth and spread
of breast cancer tumour cells in vivo. The work suggests that
re-purposing antiepileptic drugs is worthy of further study as a
potentially novel anti-cancer therapy.
Nelson M et al.:
"The sodium channel-blocking antiepileptic drug phenytoin
inhibits breast tumour growth and metastasis", Mol
Cancer. 2015 Jan 27;14(1):13. [Epub ahead of print]
William J. Brackenbury
Department of Biology, University of York, Heslington, York, UK
|
|