A new drug, retinoic acid, is under trials and development for cancer therapy in Britain and Europe, reveals Dr Susan E M Clarke, a nuclear medicine specialist at the Guy s, King s and St Thomas School of Medicine in London. Says Dr Clarke, a former president of British Nuclear Medicine Society, Cancer cells are becoming more and more aggressive and less like nor mal cells. The problem is they also don t take up iodine while scanning the patient for cancer.
Retinoic acid seems to cause the cells to redifferentiate and then be able to take up iodine.
She revealed that retinoic acid is still in phases 1 and 2 in UK and Europe. It is the future as it may help management of a small percentage of cancer patients. First reports on retinoic acid came in 1997. Retinoic acid is widely used for treatment of acne and has been started on patients who are resistant to chemotherapy. We have been treating patients for thyroid cancers and this treatment has been available for the last 50 years.