BANGALORE: A single drug may not be the perfect solution for patients suffering from cancer, according to molecular biologists at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) here.
In a paper published in a scientific journal, they say all brain tumour patients do not respond to the same drug as the tumours may have originated from flaws in different proteins. It is therefore necessary to check the molecular profile of tumours before drugs are prescribed, they say. The paper by Prof Kumaravel Somasundaram and co-authors Sudhanshu Shukla and Shruti Bhargava at the Department of Microbiology and Cell Biology, IISc, appeared in the September 10 issue of Current Science.
The authors say that cancer remains the second biggest cause of death in humans after heart disease. They wrote: “The overall median survival time of those with cancers has increased six-fold from one year to six years during the last four decades.” However, the increase in survival time has been mainly for those with cancers like breast and colon. “There has been little change for pancreas and brain cancers,” they said.
Onus on the Clinician
Shruti Bhargava, a PhD student of Prof Somasundaram’s who works on brain tumours, says the same tumours may have different causes. “They may have originated from the malfunctioning of different genes and proteins; some genes may give rise to defective RNA (nucleic acids) while others may result in changes in the DNA (another nucleic acid),” she says. The clinician must integrate all this and give the test results to a physician who can then prescribe a personalised drug, Shruti Bhargava says.