CSU's Animal Cancer Center finds nontoxic radiation drug

FORT COLLINS, COLO. — Colorado State University (CSU) researchers developed a way to administer intravenous radiation drugs to bone cancer patients without causing damage to healthy cells and vital organs.

The treatment is administered in one dose, opposed to the standard three to six treatments.

Veterinarians isolate and separate circulating blood in the area of a tumor through a heart and lung machine while delivering radioactive drugs. Doctors' goals include pinpointing a dose that will kill at least 90 percent of tumor cells.

Dr. Nicole Ehrhart, CSU cancer expert, says the blood supply has been isolated from a limb by using catheters and tourniquets then circulating the blood from that limb through a heart-lung machine. The radiation drug is administered to the isolated blood supply, saving the healthy bone marrow in the rest of the patient's body.

Because higher doses of the radiation are sent to the tumor, dogs in the study had few side effects, and the tumor die-off is significant.