Abstract
Prostate cancer patients have been suffering from limited treatment options due to late diagnosis, poor drug tolerance, and multi-drug resistance to almost all the current drug treatments. Therefore, it is important to seek a new alternative therapeutic medicine that can effectively prevent the disease and even eradicate the progression and metastasis of prostate cancer. Vernonia amygdalina Delile (VAD) is a common edible vegetable in Cameroon that has been used as a traditional medicine for some human diseases. However, to the best of our knowledge, no previous reports have explored its therapeutic efficacy against human prostate cancer. The objective of the present study was to assess the anticancer activities of VAD methanolic extracts in the prevention and treatment of prostate cancer using human androgen-independent prostate cancer (PC-3) cells as a test model. To achieve our objective, PC-3 cells were treated with various doses of VAD for 48 h. Data generated from the trypan blue test and MTT assay demonstrated that VAD extracts exhibited significant growth-inhibitory effects on PC-3 cells. Collectively, we established for the first time the antiproliferative effects of VAD on PC-3 cells, with an IC50 value of about 196.6 µg/mL. Further experiments, including cell morphology, lipid peroxidation and comet assays, and apoptosis analysis showed that VAD caused growth-inhibitory effects on PC-3 cells through the induction of cell growth arrest, DNA damage, apoptosis, and necrosis in vitro and may provide protection from oxidative stress diseases as a result of its high antioxidant content. These results provide useful data on the anticancer activities of VAD for prostate cancer and demonstrate the novel possibilities of this medicinal plant for developing prostate cancer therapies.
Highlights
Prostate cancer is the most common noncutaneous cancer and second leading cause of cancer-related death in North American males [1]
The results showed that Vernonia amygdalina Delile (VAD) modulates oxidative stress by decreasing the production of MDA levels in PC-3 cells treated with 125 and 250 μg/mL, likely because of its antioxidant properties (Figure 4)
Patients who are suffering from cancer are inclined to use medicinal plants in the hope to cure and improve the disease, prevent the disease from converting to metastatic form, support the immune system, reduce stress, and relax [30]
Summary
Prostate cancer is the most common noncutaneous cancer and second leading cause of cancer-related death in North American males [1]. Men with early prostate cancer often have no symptoms or similar symptoms to diseases such as prostatic hyperplasia, and undergo no therapy. The cancer may metastasize from the prostate to other parts of the body, to the bones and lymph nodes [2,3,4]. Prostate cancer-related deaths represent the sixth leading cause of death among men [5,6]. Cancer therapy in the form of surgery or radiotherapy is effective when the disease is detected early, many cancers are still diagnosed when cells from a primary tumor have already metastasized to other parts of the body. Several chemotherapeutic agents or drugs cause severe side effects in patients with prostate cancer [7,8]
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