Lowered Doses of Chemo Drug for Breast Ca May Promote Ca Spread to Liver

By Sondra Forsyth

If you or someone you love is being treated with paclitaxel (PTX) for breast cancer, listen up. Research done by a team of scientists in China and published June 16^th 2016 in the FEBS Journal indicates that although paclitaxel, which is the most commonly used chemotherapy for breast cancer, does suppress tumors when given at a certain dosage, at low doses PTX actually promotes cancer spread to the liver.

A release from the publisher reports that the findings suggest that lowering the dose of paclitaxel to reduce toxic side-effects is not a safe strategy.

“Paclitaxel and its analogous compounds are the first line agents widely used in clinical cancer chemotherapy. However, potential risks and reasonable treatment strategies of paclitaxel continue to be widely investigated,” wrote the authors of The FEBS Journal study.

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