Scientists Find Potential to Reverse Prostate Cancer Treatment Resistance

Researchers say they may have found a new and more efficient means of treating prostate cancer that reverses the cancer’s resistance to treatment. Although treatment is fairly effective, prostate cancer can become resistant to treatment in some advanced cases and continue to grow despite low and even below-castrate level testosterone levels.

Prostate cancer is the second most prevalent cancer type in American men after skin cancer, affecting around 288,300 men in the country and more than a million men globally every year. It has relatively favorable treatment outcomes, especially when the condition is diagnosed early. Many men have lived with the condition for decades without the need for treatment or showing symptoms.

However, prostate cancer can become resistant to treatment. Recent research indicates that scientists have discovered that blocking cancer cells from using secret messages to commandeer white blood cells can reverse prostate cancer treatment resistance. In a recent small study, researchers found that blocking the secret messages shrank prostate tumors in some patients and prevented the tumors from growing in others, potentially opening up the door to more effective prostate cancer treatments.

Johann de Bono, Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust consultant medical oncologist and Institute of Cancer Research professor of experimental cancer medicine, called the findings “tremendously exciting,” noting that the findings suggest the impending creation of a novel prostate cancer treatment.

A clinical trial led by the Institute of Oncology Research in Switzerland, the Royal Marsden, and the ICR recruited 23 advanced prostate cancer patients who were no longer responding to hormone therapy treatments. After giving patients a combination of an experimental drug that keeps white blood cells from being pulled into tumors and a hormone therapy for treating prostate cancer, 24% of the patients showed evidence that their tumors responded.

The combination resulted in a more than 30% reduction in tumor size and a “dramatic increase” in blood levels of a cancer-related biomarker called prostate-specific antigen (PSA). There was also a reduction in the amount of myeloid white blood cells that were targeted for treatment as well as a reduction in myeloid cells in tumors.

De Bono said the trial had proven the theory that myeloid cells can play a role in the treatment of a wide variety of cancers and said the research team’s findings could have implications in the treatment of several types of cancer.

ICR’s chief executive professor Kristian Helin said she looks forward to seeing how the research progresses and hopes that it will lead to the development of new treatment for prostate and many other cancer types.

More options for prostate cancer treatment may come from enterprises such as Renovaro BioSciences Inc. (NASDAQ: RENB), which are exploring novel cell and gene therapies to treat cancers that manifest as solid tumors.

NOTE TO INVESTORS: The latest news and updates relating to Renovaro BioSciences Inc. (NASDAQ: RENB) are available in the company’s newsroom at https://ibn.fm/RENB

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