Cancer Chemotherapy Flashcards
Causes of cancer
Environmental exposure
Viruses
Oncogenes
Tumour suppressor genes
Cancer is
What is a tumour
Benign behaviour
Malignant behaviour
What do tumours arise from
Second leading cause of mortality
Continuous uncontrolled growth of cells
Any abnormal proliferation of cells
Stay confined to original location
Capable of invading surrounding tissue or invading whole body
Any type of cell in body and classified by that
Treatments
When is radiotherapy possible
When is chemo required and what is it combined with
Surgery
Radiotherapy - when tumour is localised at diagnosis
Chemotherapy - once cancer metastasises so is required for effective cancer management
Combined with radiotherapy to allow resection to take place
Surgery and radio therapy are usually more possible when
tumour remains localised at the time of diagnosis
Chemotherapy drugs
Vary based on
More than 100 used today
- chemical composition
- route of administration - type of cancer targeted
- side effects
Types of chemo
Primary induction chemo
Neoadjuvant chemo
Adjuvant chemo
Primary induction chemo
Effectiveness?
Administered in patients with advanced cancer for which no alternative treatment exists.
Can be curative in only a small subset of patients who present with advance disease. (i.e. Hodgkin’s and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in adults or lymphoblastic leukemia in children).
Neoadjuvant chemo
in patients with localised cancer for which alternative local therapies, e.g. surgery, exist but which are less than completely effective.
Adjuvant chemo
alternative to?
Effective in?
An adjuvant to local therapy such as surgery or radiation. Is effective in prolonging both disease-free and overall survival in patients with different type of cancer (i.e. patients with breast, colon gastric or non-small lung cancer)
Main goal of antineoplastic agents
Eliminate cancer cells without affecting normal tissues
All cytotoxic drugs affect normal tissues as well as malignancies
Therapeutic dose
Formula
A therapeutic index is the lethal dose of a drug for 50% of the population (LD50) divided by the minimum effective dose for 50% of the population (ED50).
LD50/ED50
Log-kill hypothesis
- Chemotherapeutic agents kill a constant PROPORTION of tumour cell population (first order kinetics), rather than a constant NUMBER of cells, after each dose
- Solid cancer tumours – generally have a low growth fractions thus respond poorly to chemotherapy and in most cases need to be removed by surgery
- Disseminated cancers- generally have a high growth fraction and generally respond well to chemotherapy
Drugs can be
CCNS can
Cell cycle specific (exert actions on cells traversing cell cycle) and cell cycle non specific
sterilize tumour cells whether they are cycling or resting in the G0 compartments.
CCNS are
Alkylating agents/Antitumour antibiotics/Camptothecins/Platinuum analogues/Anthracyclines
Carcinogenic in nature and can increase the risk of secondary malignancies
Due to systemic effect
Can sterilise tumour cells whether they are cycling or in resting phase
Reduces cell proliferation
Alkylating agents - used to
- treat a wide variety of haematologic and solid tumour (i.e. ovarian cancer, brain tumours)
- immunosuppressant action
• Most of the adverse effects are generally dose-related and occur
primarily in rapidly growing tissues
• Bonemarrowdepression
• Nausea and Vomiting. Antiemetics are often given prior and after alkylating agents dosing
Alkylating agents examples
Busulfan (Alkyl sulfuantes)
- Mainly used for chronic myelogenous leukemia and other leukemias, lymphomas and myeloproliferative disorders.
- Controls tumour burden but can not prevents transformation or correct cytogenic abnormalities.
Lomustine (Nitrosoures)
- Requires biotransformation to agents that have alkylating or carbamoylating activities.
- Can cross the blood brain barrier, mainly used to treat brain tumours.
Decarbazine (Triazenes)
- Used in the treatment of various cancers, among them malignant melanoma, Hodgkin lymphoma, sarcoma, and islet cell carcinoma of the pancreas. Mainly given IV, is bioactivated in the liver.
