The Hague, May 22 (IANS) Scientists claim to have developed a new ‘chemo-bomb’ which is more effective in cancer treatment and cause less side effects than the traditional chemotherapy.
A team of German and US researchers at the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam’s University Hospital combined chemotherapy and hyperthermia by wrapping them in small fatty globules and introducing them into the blood stream, Xinhua reported.
Preliminary result showed that by heating the ‘chemo-bombs’ and letting them burst, the drugs can carry out their work locally and the tumor cells can be killed.
‘During their journey through the blood stream, they do not damage other healthy cells. By heating the tumor up to 42 degrees, the globules burst as soon as they are in the tumor, and the chemotherapy drugs are only then freed,’ said Timo ten Hagen of the Laboratory of Experimental Surgical Oncology of Erasmus MC.
Unlike the traditional method, less chemotherapy enters the body in the new treatment process. This reduces the risk of side effects and patients are less likely to suffer hair loss and irritated mucous membranes, the researchers said.
‘The therapy has proven to be very successful in European studies with patients,’ physicist Gerard van Rhoon of Erasmus MC-Daniel den Hoed said.
