Posted on 05/04/2010 5:04:32 PM PDT by nickcarraway
A common white flower could revolutionise the treatment of leukaemia and save thousands of lives, scientists have claimed.
An extract from the white flower commonly known as Baby's Breath can boost the efficiency of anti-cancer drugs by a million times, according to experts.
They found that molecules called saponins, extracted from the Gypsophila paniculata plant, appear to break down the membrane of cancer cells.
This makes it much easier for antibody-based drugs, known as immunotoxins, to attack the cancerous cells. As a result, immunotherapy used to treat certain types of leukaemia and lymphoma is increased in potency by 'over one million-fold'.
The discovery has been made by scientists working for the charity Leukaemia Busters, based in Southampton, Hants. The charity is run by David and Bee Flavell whose son Simon Flavell died with an incurable form of childhood leukaemia in 1990, aged ten.
Scientists carried out the work at the newly refurbished Simon Flavell Leukaemia Research Laboratory at Southampton General Hospital.
Dr David Flavell said: "I am usually careful about the words I use with things like this but this discovery could truly revolutionise the way these antibody-based drugs work and it will save lives.
"And this doesn't just apply to leukaemia, there is a really big possibility this can be used for many cancers too.
"This is a potentially very important discovery that could allow us to kill leukaemia cells in the patient much more effectively with much lower doses of immunotoxin.
"The challenge now is to establish how best to apply this laboratory discovery to the treatment of patients. "We are all excited at the major advance this could represent for immunotoxin treatments for leukaemia."
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
awesome
“And this doesn’t just apply to leukaemia, there is a really big possibility this can be used for many cancers too.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Hopefully, this will benefit Myeloma patients as well
Ping
Legal in the United States?
Flower power ping.
I'll break out a medical dictionary and see if I can figure out any of the abstract :-o
Cheers!
Botanical medicine ping.
BUT, BUT, BUT . . . We all know that to find cures for anything and everything we MUST use fetal stem cells. This can’t be right.
I’ll have to ask Michael J Fox about this!
thanks decimon
Thanks for the ping, Neverdem.
Could one make a tea and get the benefits?
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