The general treatment of cancer incorporates poisoning the uncontrollably growing cells to kill them or at least stop or slow down the process of their multiplication. The problem is most of these procedures harm not on the target cells but also the healthy non-cancerous cells around it. The combined effect of the cancerous cells and the damage of the healthy cells makes the patient thinner and weaker every day. But according to the latest cancer related news this problem will soon become history when the ‘molecularly targeted therapy’ comes into effect.
Design
The drug is designed according to the human cell molecules so that they can be specifically directed at the target cells instead of target areas that have the cancerous cells in focus along with a radius of healthy cells around. The molecular structures will be developed such that one drug will affect only one type of cancer cell so that the effect is more focused than bombarded on the whole area of the body.
The life-saving model drug
The cancer related news has revealed the first drug modeled for the molecularly targeted therapy is ST1571, also known as Glivec. It has proved to cure the chronic myeloid leukemia (CML), a very rare type of leukemia. Around 7,000 Americans are diagnosed with this rare leukemia every year and the invention of this drug is expected to make this disease even rarer and eventually help the planet be free from this horrible disease.
Doctor are treating this drug as a pathway to invent similar drugs for various kinds of cancer cells. The President of the American Society of Clinical Oncology has confirmed the truth of the existence of this drug and is hopeful that this is going to be a major breakthrough in the history of the treatment of cancer.
People behind the drug
The drug is being developed under the reliable brand name of Novartis Pharmaceuticals under the direction of Doctor Brian Druker, director of Portland University’s Leukemia Program at the Oregon Institute of Health Sciences. His aim is to target only the cancer cells and destroy them effectively with a non-toxic therapy. This cancer related news will also reveal to you how in 1993, Doctor Druker had observed the ST1571 working against gastro-intestinal stromal tumor or the GIST because of an enzyme similar to the target CML enzyme present in the GIST.
The focus is on the identification of the critical abnormalities in each type of cancer so that a molecularly targeted drug like the ST1571 can be invented for all types of cancer. When this becomes possible, cancer will no more be recognized as a fatal disease. It will become for the future generations what the plague and tuberculosis are for us.
It is essential to identify the critical abnormality and the unique enzyme in the cancer cells because the molecular target drugs are developed on a backward principle where the drug is created specifically for the target enzyme with a limited spectrum of use to ensure that it will be non-toxic and harmless for the surrounding cells.
