Statins, are they the key to treat bone cancer?

In general, from 80% to 90% of osteoracoma cases occur in long tubular bones that surround the knee and the shoulders. The average age of patience is 16 years, with male predominance, during the stage of higher growth.

"Generally, the disease starts on top of the bone. Externally, it is possible to see a mass that grows as a spherical tumor. It is an accumulation of cells on the bone that is not easy to detect; some x rays had to be taken in order to identify it. If people suffer from pain in this region, it is attributed to a muscular lesion but not to the generation of cells on the bone tissue," asserted Adriana Umaña, professor of the Chemistry Department of Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

One in each three patients develops metastasis into a lung, being this the biggest cause of death of this disease. The incidence could be lower in comparison to other types of cancer, but the mortality rate is higher than 90%, and the success possibilities after the treatment are reduced, which proves it aggressiveness.

Although this treatment generally requires a combination of common drugs during chemotherapy, a new focus through the use of statins (an essential component of a big group of medicines currently used), could mitigate the effects of osteosarcoma.

Scientists of Universidad Nacional de Colombia are currently working on this issue along with colleagues from Universidad de las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Spain). Statins, which initially came from the metabolism of a fungus, are known since the 70s. They help preventing the negative effects of determine enzymes. Today their use is commercial and they are only produced synthetically.

Apart from their use for cholesterol control, atherosclerosis and cerebrovascular diseases, it has been proved that they help diminishing cardiovascular incidents such as myocardial infarction, stroke, and kidney dysfunction.

"In the studies carried out to in vitro cells, in the lab, it has been proved that statins diminish the proliferation of cancer cells, as well as several types of its biological effects such as the capacity of invasion and migration. Some clinical experiments are focused on evaluating the reduction of the risk of suffering prostate and breast cancer," explained Myriam Sánchez, professor of the Chemistry Department of Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

Diseased cells grow and last longer. What statins do, according to the specialist, is to accelerate the natural process of death of these tumor cells, whose natural life programming has been altered.

Likewise, Maria Claudia Sandoval, a doctorate student of the Chemistry Department asserted that "it was found that the most invasive cells die easily due to the effect of the medicine; but normal liver cells that were analyzed resisted a higher dose. This means that statins do not have collateral damage since they do not affect the patient"s healthy cells."

For now, the studies of the treatment for osteosarcoma with statins are being carefully analised, since the research models are based on tumor cells extracted from patients and adapted models of lab rats, which are not entirely compatible with the human organism. This labor, however, represents a big hope for those who suffer from this disease.