MUSC researchers are exploring new frontiers in the treatment of prostate cancer. These advancements would benefit the 35 percent of prostate cancer patients who are not cured by surgery. “We are striving to cure the incurable,” says Dr. Thomas Keane, chairman of the Department of Urology. One promising treatment involves gene therapy. “This approach involves injecting the cancer with a group of genes that naturally causes cell death,” says Dr. James Norris, MUSC’s chair of Microbiology & Immunology. “We essentially destroy cancer cells by injecting a virus that kills them.” MUSC is part of an international team exploring another hopeful treatment that would use an injection to accelerate the death of cancer cells. This cure uses “sphyngolipids,” fatty molecules that live in the body, to help the body heal itself. While MUSC researchers are still serving as detectives in these new frontiers, the goal is to bring these discoveries from the laboratory to the patient as soon as possible. “The possibilities are tremendous,” says Dr. Keane. - Reprinted from MUSC's Checkup publication, Summer 2003
| 
