A recent research has shown that cancer cells have an inbuilt randomness in their capacity to respond to chemotherapy, which is another weapon in their treatment resistance toolbox.
Chemotherapy is a treatment to cure cancer where the medicine is used to kill cancer cells. There are different types of chemotherapy medicine but they all work in a similar way. It is the primary treatment for the majority of tumours.
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The study showed there is some noise in the process of cell death in the chemotherapy treatment and this inherent noise or randomness in the system of gene expression is an important aspect of chemoresistance.
It has been found that approximately 15% of people with neuroblastoma don’t respond to chemotherapy treatment.
The findings of the research suggest that genetics don’t account for everything and other layers of regulation and other mechanisms of tumour progression can also underpin drug response, so this needs to be considered.
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Moreover, combining chemotherapy with drugs targeting the noise of cell death may give the best results as a first-line treatment after diagnosis, before tumours lock into a state of resistance.