Riboflavin, a drug used to treat breast cancer, may help slow the growth of diffuse hemispheric glioma (brain tumors), a new study has found.
A team of scientists from the Institute of Cancer Research in London and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston found clues to the development of a specific form of DHG – the DHG, H3G34-mutant – in a study. That allowed them to explore new targeted therapies.
Diffuse hemispheric glioma is an extremely rare brain tumor that occurs in childhood and can be diagnosed between 18 and 22 months of age and currently has no cure. It is estimated that more than 30 percent of all cases of this disease have the DHG-H3G34 variant.
From laboratory tests and preclinical models, the researchers found that tumor cells disrupt the normal growth of neurons, causing them to resemble immature early neuron-like cells.
Riboflavin is a CDK4/6 inhibitor approved for the treatment of breast cancer, but in this study, it was used to treat a child with a brain tumor when other treatments had failed. Treatment resulted in stable disease for another 17 months until it relapsed.
