Obesity drug fights prostate cancer

Main Category: Obesity / Weight Loss / Fitness
Article Date: 15 Mar 2004 - 0:00 PDT

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It seems that an anti-fat drug is also effective in treating prostate cancer, say researchers.

The drug is called Orlistat. It inhibits an enzyme that promotes prostate tumour growth. Tests on mice showed that it prevents the cancer from spreading.

Researchers also hope this drug may be useful (in some form) against breast and bowel cancers.

The drug came onto the market in the UK in 1998, its brand name is Xenecal. When used as an anti-fat drug it blocks the absorption of fat in the gut. It helps people lose weight. It is a popular anti-fat drug in the UK. About half-a-million prescriptions are issued each year in the UK for Xenecal.

Scientists in the USA got information from the Human Genome Project to assess the biochemistry of prostate cancer. They then hit on the cancer fighting qualities of Xenecal.

Fatty acid synthase converts dietary carbohydrate to fat. Prostate cancer cells are affected by increased activity of fatty acid synthase (it is an enzyme). Orlistat inhibits fatty acid synthase, as well as another enzyme (from same protein family) that processes fats in the gut.

They found that Orlistat held back prostate tumour growth in mice. The mice did not experience any side-effects. Further experiments indicated that Orlistat had no impact on normal prostate cells.

Dr Jeffrey Smith, team leader,The Burnham Institute, La Jolla, California, USA said "This is a big advance in the sense that we have an approved drug - approved for one indication - that has another target and another potential disease indication, prostate cancer."