Liver cancer is one of the deadliest cancers worldwide, and its most common type is hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). This form of cancer is on the rise, partly due to increasing rates of obesity and type 2 diabetes.
These conditions can lead to nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), a severe liver disease that significantly raises the risk of developing liver cancer.
With around 25% of the global population living with metabolic dysfunction-associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD), and about 15% showing signs of NASH, the urgency to find an effective treatment cannot be overstated.
Especially when you consider that there’s currently no approved treatment for halting the progression of NASH and NASH-driven HCC.
The Breakthrough Study
Researchers from Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences have found a promising new approach to tackle this cancer. They combined two drugs, called BGP-15 and Olamkicept, in a study involving mice.
These two medications have already been shown to be safe for humans in previous studies for other diseases. The BGP-15 drug helps to reduce cellular stress in the liver, while Olamkicept works to reduce inflammation.
The study’s findings were pretty astonishing. When the mice received both drugs, their NASH symptoms improved and the progression to liver cancer was significantly slowed down.
Individually, the drugs also helped but were not as effective as when they were combined.
This means that this drug combo could be a game-changer for treating NASH and preventing the progression to liver cancer, especially since both drugs have already been tested in humans for other health conditions and were found to be safe.
What’s Next? Clinical Trials on the Horizon
With these promising results, the research team led by Professor Mark Febbraio is eager to move on to the next steps. Their ultimate goal is to get this combination of drugs into clinical trials for people who have NASH or liver cancer.
Although the study was done in mice, both drugs have been found to be safe in human clinical trials for other illnesses. This makes it easier to start new trials for NASH and liver cancer treatment.
“This is an exciting discovery for a particularly widespread and devastating disease with a low survival rate,” said Professor Febbraio.
The Monash team is hopeful that their research will lead to effective treatments for liver diseases that are becoming alarmingly common worldwide.
So, while we wait for human clinical trials to confirm these findings, the study offers a ray of hope in the fight against a deadly cancer that currently lacks effective treatments.
Given the scale and urgency of the problem, these drugs could be a vital part of the toolkit for managing liver disease and preventing the development of liver cancer.
If you care about liver health, please read studies about This hormone can prevent fatty liver and findings of Scientists find new way to treat fatty liver disease.
For more information about liver health, please read studies about dairy foods linked to liver cancer, and coffee drinkers may halve their risk of liver cancer.
The research findings can be found in Science Advances.
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