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Facts you should know about cancer drugs
The decision to use a particular cancer drug depends on many factors.
This week, we conclude the topic of cancer at the end of the internationally declared breast cancer month. The cancer facts below are drawn from Encyclopaedia Britannica Pharmacology and Gale Encyclopaedia of Cancer.
Anticancer drug, also called antineoplastic drug, is any drug that is effective in the treatment of malignant, or cancerous, disease.
The term chemotherapy is frequently equated with the use of anticancer drugs, although it more accurately refers to the use of chemical compounds treat disease generally.
One of the first drugs used for the treatment of cancer was the mechlorethamine. In the 1940s, it was found to be effective in treating lymphomas (cancers of blood, simply put).
In 1956 methotrexate became the first drug to cure a solid tumour.
In 1957, 5-fluorouracil was introduced as the first of a new class of tumour-fighting compounds known as pyrimidine analogs.
The decision to use a certain anticancer drug depends on many factors, including the type and location of the cancer, its severity, whether surgery or radiation therapy can or should be used, and the side effects associated with the drug.
Most anticancer drugs are administered intravenously; however, some can be taken orally (swallowed), and others can be injected into the muscle or channelled through the spinal cord.
Certain anticancer drugs can differentiate to some degree between normal tissue cells and cancer cells. The ability of the drugs to select and only target the cancerous cells plays an important role in reducing the severity of side effects associated with use of these drugs.
Such side effects include hair loss, sores in the mouth and on other mucous membranes, problems with the heart, anaemia, and severe nausea and vomiting.
Cancer chemotherapy is often combined with surgery to reduce the number of cancer cells and with radiation treatment to destroy more cells. It can be used as the primary form of treatment or as a supplement to other treatments. Chemotherapy is often used to treat patients with cancer that has spread from the place in the body where it started (metastasized), but it may also be used the keep cancer from coming back (adjuvant therapy).
The writer is a pharmacist
