Abstract
In the US, every 12 min, six women are diagnosed with breast cancer and one dies. This highlights a critical need for developing alternate therapies using natural compounds, which are cost effective and with less side effects. Curcumin, the yellow pigment of turmeric has been found to suppress initiation, progression, and metastasis of a variety of tumors. Multiple clinical trials highlight the efficacy of curcumin in treating breast cancer and other diseases. Our in vitro studies have demonstrated that the electrical pulse (EP) application can further enhance the effectiveness of curcumin against breast cancer cells in a therapy called electrochemotherapy (ECT). In a direct extension of these results, we studied the effect of ECT coupled with intratumoral curcumin administration (EP+Cur) on N-methyl-N-nitrosourea (MNU) induced mammary tumors in female Sprague Dawley rats. Beginning at the weaning and throughout the study, rats were fed either western diet (West) or western diet, supplemented with 1% curcumin (W+Cur). Our results showed that EP+Cur treatment led to a reduced growth rate in rats fed with W+Cur diet compared to West diet (57.14% vs. 16.67% in West diet). These results provide a foundation for further studies towards utilizing it in clinical practice.
Highlights
Breast cancer is the most common cancer of women all over the world
Our results showed that electrical pulse (EP)+Cur treatment led to a reduced growth rate in rats fed with with 1% curcumin (W+Cur) diet compared to western diet (West) diet (57.14% vs. 16.67% in West diet)
In a direct extension of these in vitro results, we studied the effect of ECT with intratumoral curcumin (EP+Cur) on N-methyl-N-nitrosourea (MNU) induced mammary tumors in Sprague Dawley (SD) rats
Summary
Breast cancer is the most common cancer of women all over the world. In the US, every 12 min, six women are diagnosed with breast cancer and one dies [1]. In a large cohort of patients with breast cancer cutaneous metastases from International Network for Sharing Practice on Electrochemotherapy (INSPECT) database from 10 European clinics, the evaluation of response in patients at 2-months following ECT resulted into a CR in 45 patients (50%), PR in 19 (21%), stable disease in 16 (18%), and disease progression in 7 (8%) [31] These and other studies [32,33,34,35,36,37] demonstrate the clinical efficacy of ECT in treating advanced, recurrent, and metastatic breast cancers, which are refractory to multiple modalities, such as surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation. This study is the first of its kind to use ECT with curcumin on a rodent model to determine the influence of curcumin supplement diet on the efficacy of ECT to treat tumors
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