Researchers from the National Centre for Asbestos Related Diseases at Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital have made an astounding discovery concerning a cure for mesothelioma cancer. The positive results became official when a commercial skin cancer cream was able to cure mice with advanced mesothelioma tumors.

Malignant Mesothelioma is a rare form of lung cancer that is almost exclusively caused by asbestos exposure. To date, mesothelioma treatment has predominantly been more palliative than curative due to the extreme latency period associated with the disease.

In fact, many patients aren’t even aware of having the disease until 30 to 50 years after the initial asbestos exposure occurred. This often results in most cases being diagnosed during the latest stages of development.

However, the new test involving the skin cancer cream may provide patients with some hope for curable treatments. The test required doctors to inject the skin cancer cream Aldara into the mesothelioma tumors of mice. Aldara is typically applied to skin to treat basal cell carcinomas. In addition, a stimulant drug known as anti-CD40 was also injected into the tumors.

The doctors found that the injections caused the immune systems to produce “killer cells”, which actually searched out and eliminated cancer cells. Researchers Steve Broomfield and Andrew Currie said 50% of the mice in the study were completely cured of the disease.

Dr. Currie later added, “This combination is so attractive because one of these drugs is already commercially available and the other is being tested in clinical trials. The time frame for undertaking our own clinical trial is minimized because the safety of the drugs has already been investigated.”

Professor Bruce Robinson, who heads the hospital’s asbestos diseases centre, said it was the first time doctors had been able to seriously contemplate having a cure for mesothelioma. He expects the new drug therapy to be in use in humans in three to five years time.

These startling findings in mice offer an enormous amount of hope for the thousands of people likely to develop mesothelioma in the future.

For more information on treating mesothelioma, visit the Mesothelioma Cancer Center.