Article

Two faces of drug therapy in cancer: drug-related lean tissue loss and its adverse consequences to survival and toxicity.

Department of Oncology, Cross Cancer Institute, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
Current opinion in clinical nutrition and metabolic care 03/2011; 14(3):250-4. DOI:10.1097/MCO.0b013e3283455d45 pp.250-4
Source: PubMed

ABSTRACT A common feature of cancer patients is loss of lean tissue, specifically skeletal muscle, which may be the result of the tumor or a side-effect of chemotherapy or other drugs. Lean tissue loss in turn has important adverse implications for toxicity of antineoplastic therapy and, hence, cancer prognosis.
Contemporary cancer populations have heterogeneous proportions of lean tissue, regardless of body weight. Wasting of lean tissue during the cancer trajectory has been associated with tumor progression. Lean tissue depletion is an independent predictor of severe toxicity in patients treated with chemotherapeutic agents of diverse classes. Patients with lean tissue depletion behave as if overdosed and have toxicity of sufficient magnitude to require dose reductions, treatment delays or definitive termination of treatment. Muscle loss may occur due to a specific effect of a chemotherapy agent (i.e. sorafenib), androgen suppression therapy or other drugs (i.e. statins such as atorvastatin).
Lean tissue wasting occurs due to cancer progression and may be exacerbated by several drug classes. This loss of lean tissue is not proportional to changes in body weight and is prognostic of enhanced treatment toxicity and reduced survival.

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    BMC Cancer 08/2011; 11:326. · 3.01 Impact Factor
Data provided are for informational purposes only. Although carefully collected, accuracy cannot be guaranteed. The impact factor represents a rough estimation of the journal's impact factor and does not reflect the actual current impact factor. Publisher conditions are provided by RoMEO. Differing provisions from the publisher's actual policy or licence agreement may be applicable.

Keywords

adverse implications
 
cancer patients
 
cancer prognosis
 
cancer progression
 
chemotherapeutic agents
 
chemotherapy agent
 
common feature
 
Contemporary cancer populations
 
diverse classes
 
drug classes
 
independent predictor
 
lean tissue
 
Lean tissue depletion
 
Lean tissue loss
 
Lean tissue wasting
 
Muscle loss
 
specific effect
 
sufficient magnitude
 
treatment toxicity
 
tumor progression
 

Carla Mm Prado