Nelfinavir - Potential Anti-cancer Activity

Potential Anti-cancer Activity

Nelfinavir were under investigation, in 2009, for potential use as an anti-cancer agent. When applied to cancer cells in culture (in vitro), it can inhibit the growth of a variety cancer types and can trigger cell death (apoptosis). When Nelfinavir was given to laboratory mice with tumors of the prostate or of the brain, it could suppress tumor growth in these animals. In vitro tests showed it may work well with sorafenib

In the United States, several clinical trials were conducted in 2008 that sought to verify whether nelfinavir is effective as a cancer therapeutic agent in humans. In some of these trials, nelfinavir was used alone in monotherapy fashion, whereas in others it was combined with other modes of cancer therapy, such as well-established chemotherapeutic agents or radiation therapy.

Good phase I results were obtained for locally advanced pancreatic cancer.

In the UK, in 2010, a phase I trial (of nelfinavir with radiotherapy), on patients with inoperable cancer, showed a doubling of survival times, and six patients had tumor regression to the extent that they became operable.

Read more about this topic:  Nelfinavir

Famous quotes containing the words potential and/or activity:

    Raising a daughter is an extremely political act in this culture. Mothers have been placed in a no-win situation with their daughters: if they teach their daughters simply how to get along in a world that has been shaped by men and male desires, then they betray their daughters’ potential But, if they do not, they leave their daughters adrift in a hostile world without survival strategies.
    Elizabeth Debold (20th century)

    Every writer is necessarily a critic—that is, each sentence is a skeleton accompanied by enormous activity of rejection; and each selection is governed by general principles concerning truth, force, beauty, and so on.... The critic that is in every fabulist is like the iceberg—nine-tenths of him is under water.
    Thornton Wilder (1897–1975)