Copper has been clinically improving the lives of people since about 1500 BCE, when an Egyptian physician first recorded its use as a treatment for inflammation. Some 35 centuries later, researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine and Italy’s Catholic University of the Sacred Heart medical school have provided solid evidence that the first metal used medicinally may now have a new role — helping save children from a devastating central nervous system cancer known as medulloblastoma.
The prospective therapy — in which copper ions are combined with a drug once heralded as treatment for alcoholism — is described in a study published today in the journal PLOS ONE.
According to the National Cancer Institute, a medulloblastoma is a fast-growing, cancerous tumor originating in the brain or spinal cord. Predominantly seen in children younger than 10, medulloblastoma is the most common pediatric brain malignancy, with between 250 and 500 new cases diagnosed annually.
Overall, the survival rate for children with medulloblastoma that has not spread is about 70%, but this can drop to as low as 40% depending on the patient’s age, the molecular subtype of the tumor (there are four), the extent of any surgical removal of previous tumors, and whether there has been metastasis (spread to other parts of the body). Treatment for pediatric medulloblastoma has traditionally been surgery, radiation and chemotherapy, individually or in combination.
