Antineoplaston - An alternative therapy in a Meso Treatment Trial

Saturday, October 01, 2005

This week a clinical trial was announced that will enroll mesothelioma patients to be treated with an agent called antineoplaston.

This therapy is based on a group of molecules discovered by Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski and are considered alternative therapy and outside the mainstream. These molecules are called antineoplastons because of their claimed ability to control cancer growth. Dr. Burzynski discovered these small molecules in human blood and urine. During his research he noted that there were differences in the protein fractions of the blood and urine of people with cancer and those without. He postulated that some of the missing proteins had anticancer properties, that the body had a natural defense against cancer. After isolating many types of proteins he tested their effect on cancer cells and normal cells in the lab. Those proteins that inhibited the growth of cancer cells, but did not affect the growth of normal cells he named antineoplastons. Over the last 30 years Dr. Burzynski has investigated the use of antineoplaston in a wide variety of cancers. In this paper he gives a good overview of his work and the current state of knowledge of antineoplaston.

Proponents of antineoplastons, of which there are several varieties, claim that they act as molecular switches to turn on tumor suppressor genes and inhibiting the uptake of amino acids critical to tumor growth.

Because the effect of antineoplaston is to reprogram the cell machinery instead of killing cells, as in radiation or chemotherapy, antineoplaston is far less toxic and has fewer side effects.

The new trial testing the efficacy of antineoplaston in treating mesothelioma will hopefully tell us if this substance has a role in the treatment of this type of cancer.