A diabetes drug that is used to treat diabetic neuropathy has shown promise in improving the effectiveness of chemotherapy for lung cancer patients, according to a recent study conducted by the University of Missouri School of Medicine and published in Clinical Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.
Despite undergoing surgical and chemotherapy treatments, more than 50% of non-metastatic, non-small cell lung cancer patients experience cancer recurrence, primarily due to drug-resistant cancer cells. Dr. Jussuf Kaifi, the lead author of the study, identified a method to enhance the susceptibility of these drug-resistant cells to chemotherapy.
“Traditional treatments such as chemotherapy often struggle to combat lung cancer due to drug resistance,” said Kaifi. “Overcoming drug resistance is crucial for improving patient outcomes and reducing mortality rates.”
The study focused on 10 non-small cell lung cancer tumors, half of which were found to be drug resistant. The drug-resistant tumors exhibited high levels of a specific enzyme called AKR1B10. When these tumors were treated with epalrestat, a medication used for diabetic neuropathy, their drug resistance decreased significantly, making them more responsive to chemotherapy.
Although epalrestat is available in several countries and is well-tolerated by patients, it has not yet been approved by the FDA for use in the United States. The medication is currently undergoing extensive clinical trials as part of the FDA approval process. If approved, epalrestat could be expedited as a treatment option for lung cancer patients.
“Developing new cancer drugs is a lengthy and costly process. Repurposing existing drugs for different diseases offers a quicker and more cost-effective solution,” explained Kaifi. “By repurposing epalrestat to tackle drug resistance, we can potentially enhance the recovery rates of lung cancer patients.”
Dr. Jussuf Kaifi, MD, PhD, serves as a thoracic surgeon at MU Health Care, an assistant professor of surgery at the MU School of Medicine, and the Chief of Thoracic Surgery. His expertise includes general and minimally invasive thoracic surgeries for both malignant and benign conditions of the lungs. He earned his medical degree and doctorate from the University of Hamburg in Germany.
The research paper titled “Targeting AKR1B10 by drug repurposing with epalrestat overcomes chemoresistance in non-small cell lung cancer patient-derived tumor organoids” was recently published in Clinical Cancer Research. The research team from MU comprised research scientists Kanve Suvilesh, PhD, and Yariswamy Manjunath, PhD; PhD candidates Yulia I. Nussbaum and Mohamed Gadelkarim; Raju Murugesan, PhD, a bioinformatician from the MU Institute for Data Science and Informatics; Chi-Ren Shyu, PhD, the Director of the MU Institute for Data Science and Informatics; Akhil Srivastava, PhD, an assistant professor of cancer biology; Satyanarayana Rachagani, DVM, PhD, an associate professor of Veterinary Medicine and Surgery; and Wesley C. Warren, PhD, a genomics professor. Feng Gao, Matthew A. Ciorba, Jonathan B. Mitchem, and Guangfu Li also contributed to the study.
