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Updated: Jul 15, 2026
The Colon-26 Carcinoma Tumor-bearing Mouse as a Model for the Study of Cancer Cachexia
Published on: November 30, 2016
The anaemia of cancer: death by a thousand cuts
1Division of Hematology, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Maryland 21210, USA. jlspivak@jhmi.edu
Abstract:
Cancer has a negative systemic impact on its host in addition to its local or metastatic effects, and no cancer complication is more ubiquitous than anaemia, a condition for which there is now a specific remedy, the recombinant growth factor erythropoietin. This is not a trivial therapeutic consideration, because cancer-associated anaemia has an adverse influence on survival regardless of tumour type. However, the pharmacological correction of anaemia with recombinant erythropoietin could promote tumour growth, whereas the use of tumour-necrosis factor-alpha (TNFalpha) and TNF-related apoptosis-inducing ligand as antitumour agents could exacerbate anaemia, thereby perpetuating tissue hypoxia and tumour progression.
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