Steroid may Help Cancer Patients Survive Longer

Cancer patients may survive longer if given dexamethasone drug during surgery. Mortality rate is three times more in patients who did not receive dexamethasone compared to those who received the drug, as per the team of researchers.

Dexamethasone can improve mid- to long-term outcomes in patients with non-immunogenic cancers like sarcoma and cancers of the breast, uterus, ovary, esophagus, pancreas, thyroid, bones and joints.

‘Anesthesiologists should recommend administering dexamethasone to patients undergoing surgery for non-immunogenic cancers.’

"Dexamethasone has positive and negative effects - it inhibits cancer growth, but also suppresses the immune system," said Maximilian Schaefer, M.D., Ph.D., senior author of the study and director of the Center for Anesthesia Research Excellence, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, Boston.

"Previous research has reported that in cancers in which the immune system controls cancer growth, the positive and negative effects of dexamethasone balance each other, so there is no benefit. Ours is the first large study to show that for a wide variety of cancers where the immune system does not play a major role, the positive effects seem to predominate."

Researchers analyzed the records of 74,058 patients who had surgeries to remove non-immunogenic cancerous tumors between 2005 and 2020 at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and between 2007 and 2015 at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston.

Around 34% patients received dexamethasone during surgery. After 90 days, 209 (0.83%) of the patients who had received dexamethasone died vs. 1,543 (3.2%) of patients who did not receive the drug.

Those who received the drug still had a 21% reduced risk of dying within one year after surgery. A second analysis determined dexamethasone was particularly beneficial for patients with cancers of the ovary, uterus or cervix.

"Based on our data, physician anesthesiologists should feel more confident in administering dexamethasone to patients undergoing surgery for non-immunogenic cancers," said Dr. Schaefer. "It not only helps with nausea, but it also may result in improved survival."

Source: Medindia