Colo-rectal Cancer Management - Biological Therapy

Creator: Dr. Anitha Paderla
Keywords: Biological Therapy, colorectal cancer, colon, rectal, cancer, Colon Cancer, Rectal Cancer.

Author - Dr. Anitha Paderla, MBBS

Medically Reviewed by Dr. Sunil Shroff, MBBS, MS, FRCS (UK), D. Urol (Lond) on Jul 07, 2020

Colo-rectal Cancer Management - Biological Therapy

Biological therapy causes fewer side effects than chemotherapy drugs.

Cancer cells are different from normal cells. Biological or Targeted therapies make use of this principle to attack cancer cells. Because of this, they should cause fewer side effects than chemotherapy drugs.

The medications used in this therapy are:

Cetuximab
Panitumumab
Bevacizumab

Cetuximab was the first targeted therapy approved for treating colorectal cancer. It is a man-made protein called a monoclonal antibody. It specifically attacks the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), a molecule that often appears in high amounts on the surface of cancer cells, thereby causing shrinkage of the tumor. Panitumumab also acts in a similar way.

Bevacizumab is another monoclonal antibody, approved for first-line use against metastatic colorectal cancer. It is used along with chemotherapy drugs. This antibody is directed against vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), a protein that helps tumors form new blood vessels.

Clinical trials are in progress to study different combinations of chemotherapy agents and targeted therapies.

References:

Colorectal Cancer-Patient Version - (http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/types/colon-and-rectal)
Colorectal Cancer - (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/colorectalcancer.html)

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Colo-rectal Cancer Management - Biological Therapy