Advancing Drug Therapy for Brain Tumours: A Current Review of the Pro-Inflammatory Peptide Substance P and its Antagonists as Anti-Cancer Agents.

Advancing Drug Therapy for Brain Tumours: A Current Review of the Pro-Inflammatory Peptide Substance P and its Antagonists as Anti-Cancer Agents. Recent Pat CNS Drug Discov. 2014 Nov 11; Authors: Mander K, Harford-Wright E, Lewis KM, Vink R Abstract Evidence for the involvement of the Substance P (SP)/NK1 receptor system in the development and progression of cancer strongly supports its potential as a therapeutic target in malignancies. Novel strategies for approaching cancer treatment are urgently required particularly with regard to tumours of the central nervous system (CNS), which are notoriously difficult to effectively treat and associated with extremely poor prognosis for many patients. This is due, in part, to the presence of the highly specialised blood-brain barrier, which is known to restrict common treatments such as chemotherapy and hinder early tumour diagnosis. Additionally, tumours of the CNS are difficult to surgically resect completely, often contributing to the resurgence of the disease many years later. Interestingly, despite the presence of the blood-brain barrier, circulating tumour cells are able to gain entry to the brain and form secondary brain tumours; however, the underlying mechanisms of this process remain unclear. Tachykinins, in particular Substance P, have been implicated in early blood-brain barrier disruption via neurogenic inflammation in a number of other CNS pathologies. Recent evidence also sugg...
Source: Recent Patents on CNS Drug Discovery - Category: Drugs & Pharmacology Tags: Recent Pat CNS Drug Discov Source Type: research