WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - Statin, a widely prescribed drug to lower cholesterol levels, may prevent cancer development caused by chronic inflammation, according to researchers at Mass General Cancer Center.
'Chronic inflammation is a major cause of cancer worldwide,' said senior author Shawn Demehri, MD, PhD, a principal investigator at the Center for Cancer Immunology and Cutaneous Biology Research Center of Massachusetts General Hospital and an associate professor of Dermatology at Harvard Medical School.
'We investigated the mechanism by which environmental toxins drive the initiation of cancer-prone chronic inflammation in the skin and pancreas,' he continued. 'Furthermore, we examined safe and effective therapies to block this pathway in order to suppress chronic inflammation and its cancer aftermath.'
During the study, the researchers observed a protein called interleukin-33 or IL-33, that causes inflammation on skin and pancreas, eventually leading to cancer development.
While screening all the drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drugs Administration, the researchers noted that a statin class drug, pitavastatin, can suppress the inflammation on skin caused by the environment.
Moreover, researchers found that pitavastatin reduces risk of chronic pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer, according to health record data of more than 200 million people across North America and Europe.
'Next, we aim to further examine the impact of statins in preventing cancer development in chronic inflammation in the liver and gastrointestinal tract and to identify other novel, therapeutic approaches to suppress cancer-prone chronic inflammation,' said Demehri.
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