New hope has emerged for people afflicted with a form of kidney cancer known as renal cell carcinoma, as researchers in the United Kingdom point toward an existing drug they say can help patients suffering from this malady.
A team from the Wellcome Sanger Institute at the University of Cambridge and Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has postulated that a type of white blood cell known as macrophages, of which some contain the gene IL1B, is “crucial in tumor development”.
The authors of this new study, which has been published in Cancer Cell, argued that targeting these IL1B macrophages may help treat renal cell carcinoma and that existing drugs originally designed to prevent lung cancer may be used for this.
“I’m optimistic that targeting IL1B macrophages may provide us with a way to treat renal cell carcinomas without resorting to surgery,” Dr. Thomas Mitchell, senior author of the new study, said as quoted in a press release by the Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.
While researchers are yet to prove their hypothesis via clinical trials, they are already exploring these new options.