Cancer Treatment Discovery

Monday, May 14th 2007, 8:58 am

By: News On 6

NORMAN, Okla. (AP) -- Two professors at the University of Oklahoma have made a discovery which may lead to a better treatment for cancer. Thomas Pento and Roger Harrison helped develop a fusion protein which prevents some cancer cells from ingesting a vital protein. But the fusion protein doesn't affect normal cells.

Current treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation kill normal cells along with cancerous cells and often leave patients sick.

Pento says the research started with breast cancer and early experiments were successful. Testing has also been successful so far on lung, prostate and pancreatic cancers.

Harrison says much clinical testing remains and it could ten years before the treatment is approved by the Federal Drug Administration.