Barken used noscapine to treat a handful of prostate cancer patients before retiring from clinical practice.
Barken is encouraging academic institutions to follow up this successful laboratory research with a human clinical trial.
Rogosnitzky pointed out the significant advantages that noscapine could present as a treatment for prostate cancer.
"Noscapine is effective without the unpleasant side effects associated with other common prostate cancer treatments. Because noscapine has been used as a cough-suppressant for nearly half a century, it already has an extensive safety record. This pre-clinical study shows that the dose used to effectively treat prostate cancer in the animal model was also safe,” he said.
Currently, hormone therapy and chemotherapy, along with radiation and surgery, are used to slow the progression of advanced prostate cancer. Side effects resulting from these treatments include impotence, incontinence, fatigue, anemia, brittle bones, hair loss, reduced appetite, nausea and diarrhea.
However, no toxic side effects were observed in the laboratory study of noscapine.
The study was published in the latest issue of the European medical journal Anticancer Research
Source-ANI
PRI/SK