This study may be important for many who may otherwise be unable to tolerate the heart problems associated with short infusion times of drugs like doxorubicin.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releas...-lat112206.php
Longer anthracycline therapy reduces heart failure in adult cancer patients
(extract)
Stretching out a dose of chemotherapy over six or more hours may reduce the risk of heart problems caused by certain commonly used cancer drugs, according to a new review of recent research.
Anthracycline drugs like daunorubicin and doxorubicin are used to treat many types of solid tumors and blood cancers such as leukemias in adults and children.
Anthracycline therapy can be very successful at controlling cancer, but heart damage caused by anthracycline treatment “is a considerable and serious problem,” said Dr. Elvira van Dalen of the Emma Children’s Hospital in the Netherlands.
She and her colleagues found that the rates of heart failure among adult patients receiving anthracycline therapy were significantly lower when the patients had an infusion of the drug that lasted six or more hours, compared to shorter infusions times.
In five studies involving 557 patients, the longer treatment cut the risk of heart failure by nearly 75 percent compared to the risk in patients who received the short treatment.
van Dalen said the prolonged dose of six hours or more “might be justified” if a patient is at high risk of heart damage or needs a high cumulative dose of the chemotherapy.
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