Pharmacological Intervention with Signal Transduction

Abstract

It has been 50 years since the first anticancer drug of the modern era, nitrogen mustard, underwent clinical trial in a cancer patient [1]. Nitrogen mustard was introduced into general clinical practice in 1949. Since that time there has been a steady increase in the number of anticancer drugs so that in the U.S.A. there are now 45 officially approved anticancer drugs excluding steroidal agents and radiopharmaceuticals [2]. Despite this large number of drugs the early hope that chemotherapy would provide a major check against cancer has not been realised. Today, chemotherapy is curative for about 12% of human cancers, including choriocarcinoma, acute lymphocytic leukaemia, Hodgkin's disease and testicular cancer. However, most human cancers, those causing over 75% of cancer deaths including lung, colon, breast and prostate cancer, are refractory to chemotherapy. Survival rates for cancer patients in the U.S.A. are about 50%, compared to 40% in the early 1960s, before the widespread use of chemotherapy [3]. There is clearly a need for new treatments and approaches to dealing with cancer and this includes new types of cancer drugs.