DNA Therapies Could Give Superior Options for Treating Mesothelioma than Chemotherapy
Oncologists and other cancer doctors decide what type of treatment to administer with every patient. There are many options. There exists no regular treatment option for peritoneal mesothelioma cancer sufferers. This is due to the cancers high mortality rate, rareness, low treatment success rate, and small number of studies to provide meaningful statistics.
Mesothelioma patients have historically had a bleak outlook, but doctors have recently made progress. Treatments for cancer are traditionally surgery (taking out the tumor and surrounding tissue), radiation (killing the cancerous cells with radiation), and chemotherapy (poisoning the cancerous cells.) Each one of these methods have problems. Patients with mesothelioma have not responded well to traditional radiation therapy. In hopes to lessen damage to healthy tissue, researches are studying ways to aim radiation right at the tumor.
The mesothelial tissue around the tumor is removed by surgery. The surgery is difficult and challenging, with unknown effects or benefits to patients. The usual chemotherapy cocktails effective on other cancers are not effective on mesothelioma, and combinations of chemotherapy agents have been tried, but without much success. As with radiation, research is going toward controlling the physical location of the treatment with emphasis on the pleural cavity.
Many advanced techniques in cancer treatment are tried on mesothelioma patients because of its high fatality rate. These techniques include a biologic therapy called the agent interleukin 2 and anti-angiogenesis drugs like thalidomide. Pemetrexed (Alimta) is a new drug that has shown results in extending life.
Considered by oncologists is where the tumor is located, what stage the mesothelioma is in, and the age and health of the patient. Two exotic ways of attacking mesothelioma are gene therapy and photodynamic therapy. Clinical trials using these techniques are being offered to some of those who have mesothelioma.
