Treatment advances for prostate cancer bone tumors

The authors aimed to highlight  treatments available for bone tumors resulting from prostate cancer.

When prostate cancer spreads outside of the prostate, tumors can form all over the body, particularly on the bone. Bone tumors can significantly affect patients by causing joint pain, nerve pain and fractures. Once cancer has spread to the bone it is very difficult to treat. Androgen-deprivation therapy (form of hormone treatment that targets the male sex hormones involved in prostate cancer such as testosterone) is the main treatment option for prostate cancer bone tumors, however the majority of patients treated will develop resistance to treatment and it will no longer work. 

The aim of this study was to identify treatments available for bone tumors derived from prostate cancer.

Zoledronic acid (Aclasta, Zometa) is an approved treatment for bone tumors in prostate cancer and showed significant reductions in 6 month risks of skeletal-related events (joint pain, fractures and nerve pain). Denosumab (Xgeva) showed a 4.2 month improvement in bone metastasis-free survival (period of time patient survives without bone tumor development following treatment) but no significant difference in overall survival (patients who did not die from prostate cancer following treatment).

A combination of dasatinib (BMS-354825, Sprycel) and docetaxel (Taxotere) achieved a 50% decrease in prostate specific antigen (PSA- protein elevated in the blood when prostate cancer is present) in 57% of patients and a partial response (cancer responded to treatment but was not completely eradicated) in 60% of patients treated.

Patients treated with strontium-89 (⁸⁹Sr) and radium-223 (Alpharadin, Xofigo) experienced significant improvements in overall survival and bone pain when combined with drugs such as docetaxel. Radium-223 was shown to prolong time from treatment until a skeletal-related event was experienced, increase overall survival by nearly 3 months compared to patients who did not receive radium-223 (14 months compared to 11.2 months) and resulted in mild side-effects (nausea, fatigue, bone pain, vomiting and diarrhea). 

The authors conclude that though there are treatments available to manage prostate cancer-derived bone tumors, further work is required to identify a successful treatment.

Results presented in this study were taken from numerous experiments where the researchers protocols and results may differ. 

If you are considering treatment for prostate cancer-derived bone tumors, please consult your doctor on the best option available for you.