Repurposing radiosensitising medicines for radiotherapy: an overview.

Area of Science:

• Oncology
• Pharmacology
• Radiotherapy

Background:

• Drug repurposing offers faster, cheaper cancer treatment options.
• Established non-cancer drugs can potentially enhance tumor radiosensitivity when combined with radiotherapy (RT).

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the landscape of repurposed drugs for combined use with radiotherapy.
• To identify factors contributing to successful and unsuccessful drug repurposing for radiosensitization.

Main Methods:

• A literature-based approach was used to identify radiosensitizing drugs that have entered clinical trials with RT or chemoradiotherapy.
• Analysis of clinical trial data for successful and unsuccessful repurposing efforts.

Main Results:

• Identified 42 radiosensitizing drugs with diverse non-cancer indications and mechanisms of action.
• Nicotinamide and nimorazole are two compounds in limited clinical use with RT.
• Common reasons for unsuccessful repurposing include poor trial reporting, lack of biomarkers, suboptimal drug properties, and inadequate funding.

Conclusions:

• Successful drug repurposing for RT requires robust trial design, biomarker identification, and consideration of pre-clinical and clinical data.
• Future efforts should focus on mitigating identified challenges to improve the success rate of repurposed drugs in radiotherapy.