

DCA: A simple, unpatentable cancer treatment? - anxiousape
http://www.dca.med.ualberta.ca/Home/index.cfm

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crocowhile
The DCA is a promising drug and there's many people working on it, on many
kind of tumors.

Be aware that this "it's unpatentable" thing is bullshit. You don't patent a
drug, you patent the use of the drug for a certain purpose. In fact,
Michelakis himself appears to have patented DCA for several cancer forms.
[http://www.google.com/patents?q=Michelakis&btnG=Search+P...](http://www.google.com/patents?q=Michelakis&btnG=Search+Patents)

[http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=RErGAAAAEBAJ&dq=M...](http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=RErGAAAAEBAJ&dq=Michelakis)

~~~
stcredzero
_Be aware that this "it's unpatentable" thing is bullshit._

If there is a huge market for X, there is an economically feasible
"unpatentable" enabler of X, then someone is going to make money doing X, and
even the law won't be able to stop them.

~~~
william42
But that's not really different for any other drug.

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code177
The article seems filled with errors about basic biology, so here's the actual
research: <http://www.dca.med.ualberta.ca>

~~~
pg
Replaced it with that.

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willscott
The text of the article is poorly written - with a focus too much on
conspiracy theory rather than on actual science. The linked article is from
2007, and only reports on preliminary research.

There's a reason we have the scientific setup that we do, and it is to filer
the noise, and protect the authenticity of the science. If these guys from
Alberta are able to come back with good results on human trials, then other
labs will independently confirm the result. The fact that drug companies
aren't picking up research at a preliminary stage on a drug that won't be
profitable shouldn't be surprising, but it also doesn't mean that the research
won't go forwards.

~~~
pg
(This comment refers to the original, crappy article this link used to go to.)

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zem
scienceblogs had a great piece on this:
[http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2007/01/in_which_my_words_...](http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2007/01/in_which_my_words_will_be_misinterpreted.php)

quoting:

What is most pernicious about the conspiracy-mongering stories being spread
about DCA is that it builds false hope. People with cancer hear about this
drug, and they think there's an amazing cure out there that's being withheld
from them because of the greed of big pharma.

~~~
ams6110
"Big Pharma" have to invest a lot of R&D in cancer drugs. Do they really make
profits in the "greedy" realm on this effort overall? I'd think they rake in
the $$$ on stuff like Viagra and Rogaine.

~~~
pygy_
"Big Pharma" invest more in marketing and advertising than in R&D.

Even though some drugs are indeed more lucrative for them than others, they
would not develop cancer drugs if they were not profitable.

~~~
hga
" _marketing and advertising_ " also means informing doctors about new drugs
and therapies. Outside of "miracle" drugs or new drug categories (e.g. ED or
the low side effecting SSRIs like Prozac) that get "promoted" by the media
etc. a new drug will do few any good if doctors don't know enough about it.

This is especially true for cancer drugs marketed to oncologists (which I
suspect are never marketed directly to consumers...). The field is _very_
complex ... and I recall that one of the major factors in the difference in
outcomes between your local medical system and the major cancer centers is the
better current knowledge of the practitioners in the latter.

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gdilla
Yes it is real. You can read the review article here:
<http://www.nature.com/bjc/journal/v99/n7/full/6604554a.html>

The only problem is that most cancers develop mechanisms to block or
inactivate apoptosis pathways of which there are several, so DCA will not work
in every type of cancer since these apoptosis pathways need to be intact
before cancer cells will die. It is never that simple and some scientists tend
to oversimplify the story.

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mvkel
A lobby needs to be created to educate the public that each cancer is its own
disease, and there can never be a cure for all cancers in one magical formula.

~~~
electromagnetic
I can 100% guarantee that I have a cheap and successful way of killing all
cancerous cells of any type with one simple and effective treatment, with only
one side effect. I call the treatment plumbum-therapy.

(Note: reported side effect to therapy includes death by gunshot wound)

I think people would prefer to opt for a more expensive treatment plan.

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extramoose
May 12, 2010 - Edmonton, AB - Medical Researchers at the University of Alberta
reported today evidence that the orphan generic drug Dichloroacetate (DCA) may
hold promise as potential therapy for perhaps the deadliest of all human
cancers: a form of brain cancer called glioblastoma.

[http://www.dca.med.ualberta.ca/Home/Updates/2010-05-12_Updat...](http://www.dca.med.ualberta.ca/Home/Updates/2010-05-12_Update.cfm)

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scythe
<http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=5166>

This is a great article from the sciencebasedmedicine guys about the state of
dichloroacetate as a cancer treatment. A bit long-winded, but totally
realistic about the current prospects. The links at the bottom are all great
too.

~~~
melvinram
Great article. Here's a summary (or at least how I understood it) for those
that don't read it (which I recommend you do):

* Mitochondrias (an organele in our cells that is considered the battery of a cell) in cancer patients typically don't function as they normally should.

* In 2007, University of Alberta researchers led by Evangelos Michelakis, announced a non-human trial that showed promising signs of stopping and regressing cancer using a substance known as DMC.

* DMC is thought to work by fixing bad mitochondrias in cancer patients (obviously over simplified).

* DMC is non-patentable and is easily made, so the news became a big anti-big-pharma story and spread like wild fire because the researchers were having trouble getting funds for doing clinical trials, since there was no money that could be made from this drug if it proved to work.

* The hopes for many cancer patients skyrocketed creating demand for DMC.

* A few ethically challenged entrepreneurs setup websites to sell DMC under the guise of DMC for Pets to get around FDA.

* There are potential side-effects when DMC is mixed with other drugs so a lot of people put their their lives in danger by doing self treatment, but no results were ever posted to the forums. The suspected reason is that the forum admins removed all negative reports.

* The websites were shut down by FDA after some time.

* A couple days ago, Michelakis's team at UofA announced the results of a clinical trial in which they administered DMC to 5 patients. This published in a journal but you can see their announcement at [http://www.dca.med.ualberta.ca/Home/Updates/2010-05-12_Updat...](http://www.dca.med.ualberta.ca/Home/Updates/2010-05-12_Update.cfm)

* Of the 5, patient #1, #2 & #5 showed promising results. Patient #3 died (not attributed to DMC) and patient #4 needed a 2nd surgery 3 months after starting, which it didn't specifically say but I assumed to mean that it wasn't considered successful.

* Key things to note:
    
    
      - the trials where a combination of phase 0 
        and phase 1 trials. 
    
      -- Phase 0 = seek to determine if the drug 
         is doing biochemically what it is expected 
         to do based on preclinical studies, usually 
         by taking a biopsy and doing chemical tests.
      
      -- Phase 1 "are designed to determine two things: 
         dose and dose-limiting side effects" ... 
         not efficacy of the drug.
    
      - all 5 were treated differently and in 
        combination with other treatments. 
        This makes the tests not reliable 
        enough to make conclusions from. 
    
      - Treatments often show very very promising 
        signs when dealing with non-humans but fail 
        when the rubber meets the road in real 
        clinical trials.
      
      - DMC shows promise but it's dangerous for 
        people to self-treat and inefficient to 
        shortcut the scientific process of testing 
        and evaluating treatments.

~~~
melvinram
Oops, I said DMC instead of DCA.

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iwitho
The latest update which was about a year ago at the U of A site listed a 5
person clinical trial that had very modest effects on glioblastomas, only 1
type of cancer. Source:
[http://www.dca.med.ualberta.ca/Home/Updates/2010-05-12_Updat...](http://www.dca.med.ualberta.ca/Home/Updates/2010-05-12_Update.cfm)

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stevetjoa
Encouraging, but read this too, particularly the edit at the bottom, along
with the link to ualberta.ca dated May 12, 2010:
[http://www.tweaktown.com/news/19694/has_cancer_been_cured_bi...](http://www.tweaktown.com/news/19694/has_cancer_been_cured_big_pharma_doesn_t_like_that_idea_very_much/index.html)

~~~
lostbit
Yes... That's exactly where I ended too. The main page of the site,
<http://www.dca.med.ualberta.ca/>, still points to the 2007 research/article.
Maybe they didn't want to break the optimism.

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mazsa
Science: <http://stm.sciencemag.org/content/2/31/31ra34.abstract>

Full text:
[https://www.burtongoldberg.com/home/burtongoldberg/DCA%20and...](https://www.burtongoldberg.com/home/burtongoldberg/DCA%20and%20Glioblastoma%20May%20%202010.pdf)

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FreakshowLee
DCA doesn't cure cancer, you dopes.
[http://www.cancer.org/AboutUs/DrLensBlog/post/2010/05/14/Mor...](http://www.cancer.org/AboutUs/DrLensBlog/post/2010/05/14/More-
On-Dichloroacetate-\(DCA\)-In-Cancer-Treatment.aspx)

