Sea Sponge Drug Boosts Breast Cancer Survival?

A certain drug developed from sea sponges could possibly boost breast cancer survival in women, according to a new study.

Researchers led by Professor Chris Twelves, based at the University of Leeds and Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, looked at 1,800 women with breast cancer that had started to metastasize, or spread, to other parts of the body. They found that when treating patients with the cancer drug eribulin, specifically those with advanced triple negative breast cancer, they lived on average an extra five months.

"Despite advances in the diagnosis and treatment of women with breast cancer, more than 11,600 women still die from invasive breast cancer each year in the UK. New and better treatments are needed for people fighting the disease," study author, Professor Chris Twelves said in a statement.

And Twelves and colleagues hope that eribulin could be the drug that can make a difference. Eribulin, which was originally developed from a sea sponge called Halichondria okadai, works by stopping the cancer cells from separating into two new cells.

Cancer that metastasizes to other organs accounts for a whopping 90 percent of all cancer deaths. And for those with breast cancer, if diagnosed when the disease has already starting making its way to other parts of the body, 10-year survival is around one in 10. That's compared to nearly nine in 10 for those diagnosed at the earliest stage.

"These results are encouraging and may offer valuable extra time to patients whose cancers have stopped responding to conventional treatments and have few options left," explained Martin Ledwick, head information nurse at Cancer Research UK. "Advanced breast cancer can be very difficult to treat so these results take us a small, important step in the right direction."

"Although eribulin isn't a cure," he added, "it's an extra treatment option for patients with advanced breast cancer, which can be priceless to them and their families."

The results were presented at the 2014 National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) Cancer Conference in Liverpool, and the study's abstract can be found here.