Obesity, cancer and cachexia

Abstract

Obesity is a modern times malady of globalized world and it is linked to various types cancer. The cachexia is a multifactorial paraneoplastic disease and it is also associated with obesity and cancer. The main features of cachexia are loss of muscle mass, fat mass, nausea, vomiting, fatigue, increased systemic inflammation and associated involuntary weight loss. This may be described as a result of destructive communication between tumor cells, adipose tissue, skeletal muscle characterized by an inflammatory response by the host against tumor cells and tissues. Due to all these cellular and molecular events, systemic inflammation is considered as a major feature in cachexia progression and maintenance. There are many other primary, secondary and tertiary molecular events and mechanisms are associated with these diseases. In this mini review, we briefly describe the inter relation between obesity, cancer development and cachexia and their therapeutic interventional approaches.