Uterine cancer is the only cancer that has seen survival rates continuously fall in the last 40 years, but research published March 4 in the British Journal of Cancer suggests that using a medication to block a protein called Galectin-3 could be a more effective treatment.
Elevated levels of the protein, also referred to as Gal3, has also been associated with worse outcomes for patients with uterine serous cancer — a more aggressive type of uterine cancer, which affects about 10% of uterine cancer patients, but accounts for about 40% of uterine cancer deaths.
The study also revealed that tumors with lower levels of Gal3 present were less likely to grow and spread. Testing medications to block Gal3 in animals yielded fewer and smaller tumors.
"[O]ur results suggest that Gal3 can contribute via a variety of mechanisms to the highly aggressive nature of uterine serous cancers," the researchers wrote of their results.
The study is said to be the first providing evidence that Gal3 "has the potential to influence either directly, or indirectly cell proliferation, stemness, cell adhesion, migration, invasive potential, and or tumor microenvironment, supporting the concept that Gal3 likely contributes to the more aggressive clinical properties of [uterine serous cancer]," the authors claim.