Now ‘find the target and hit it’ theory to help the Cancer patients

By Vikas Vaidya

Chemotherapy, the term is used in case of Cancer patients. Wherever surgery is not applicable in case of cancer patients, Chemotherapy is given to them. In this therapy, drug is injected in the body which kills cancer cells, but unfortunately it kills good cells also causing various problems to the patients. Now after a lot of research in this field, doctors have come out with the Targetted Drug Delivery to remove this side-effect. It actually targets the molecule that is creating problem and hit it.
Dr P S Kadam Amare, Head of Cancer Cytogenetics Laboratory, Tata Memorial Hospital said, “This therapy is being applied in case of Chronic Myeloid Leukemia (CML), (CML is a type of cancer that starts in the blood-forming cells of the bone marrow and invades the blood. In CML, leukemia cells tend to build up in the body over time, but many people don’t have any symptoms for at least a few years). It only hit abnormal cell. Genetic marker needs to be identified then anti-protein element is to be hit.”
Targeted drug delivery, is a method of delivering medication to a patient in a manner that increases the concentration of the medication in some parts of the body relative to others. The goal of a targeted drug delivery system is to prolong, localise, target and have a protected drug interaction with the diseased tissue. This helps maintain the required plasma and tissue drug levels in the body, thereby preventing any damage to the healthy tissue via the drug.  The advantages to the targeted release system is the reduction in the frequency of the dosages taken by the patient, having a more uniform effect of the drug, reduction of drug side-effects, and reduced fluctuation in circulating drug levels.
Dr Anand Pathak, well-known Oncologist in Central India pointed, “Current theme is find target and hit it. It is called precision medicine which means precisely drawn treatment plan for one particular individual cancer in that patient. It may not be applicable to other patient for the same cancer. This therapy is being applied not only in CML but lung, Ca Cervix, leukemia other than CML, breast cancer.”
Most of the time Cancer is detected when it reaches last stage. There are no symptoms or signs through which we can predict Cancer. It is the general perception. But Dr Amare has something different to say. She said, “See, in case of breast cancer woman can feel it if she do self check-up regularly and then go for mammography. Similarly, those suffer from mouth cancer can get it detected if they notice white spots inside mouth. Suppose somebody suffers from particular problems like difficulty in swallowing and if it persists then it should be investigated. It can be Cancer.”
Dr Pathak said, “Common public and general practitioners should be made aware of certain things. In many cases, general practitioners do not think of malignancy. The reluctancy to go for investigation is causing problems. In our region the cancers of oral cavity, food pipe, breast, ca cervix are prevalent.”

Some cancers can be prevented from getting carried

“Blood cancers are based on genetic biomarkers. Some diseases are hereditary or non-hereditary too. Gene comes from fore-fathers. Some abnormal genes are not expressed in forefathers and they penetrate in the child giving full malignancy. In such cases if such patients survive then we can take precautions so that it should not be carried away to the next generation,” said Dr P S Kadam Amare.

Collaborative research can be helpful

Expressing regret that research in cancer sector is not upto the mark, Dr P S Kadam Amare said, “Basically many things are not included in our syllabus. We do not update the same. In foreign countries they have updated the syllabus. Such CMEs organised by Dr Anand Pathak really helps future medicos as well as present practitioner to add the knowledge to their kitty.”
“Research is done in specialised laboratories and specialised hospitals. That is good, but apart from that I think collaborative research is more beneficial. In foreign countries such research is given due importance. In such research, results are better and nothing go waste unlike individual research,” pointed Dr Anand Pathak.