• Journal of Korean Traditional Oncology
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.75-84
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• 2009

Gekko has been used for several diseases including cancer in Oriental medicine and fork herbalogy. Nevertheless, its origin as herbal medicine and its efficacy and mechanism as anti-tumor drug have not yet been thoroughly reported in Korea. This study aimed to investigate anti-tumor effect of Gekko through selected articles from cqvip database in China. In vitro and In vivo, Gekko could obviously inhibit tumor growth, induce tumor cells apoptosis, reduce micro-vessel density in tumor tissue through down regulating VEGF & bFGF protein expression, promote cytotoxicity of lymphocyte. Gekko could improve survival rate, relive clinical symptoms, improve quality of life, and relieve anti-tumor treatment reaction, suggesting that Gekko might be a effective anti-tumor drug.

• The Journal of Internal Korean Medicine
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• v.42 no.2
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• pp.104-113
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• 2021

Introduction: The aim of this study is to report on the effectiveness of Korean medicine to improve symptoms of chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN). Some patients are treated with medication, but medications may have no effect in some patients. Korean medicine treatments have been used in such patients, but few reports exist. Case Presentation: A 58-year-old female patient with CIPN reported symptoms of bilateral limb pain and tingling sensations as well as cold sensations in bilateral lower legs and hands, fatigue, and bilateral limb weakness. To reduce the patient's symptoms, we provided Korean medical treatment, including herbal medicine (Uchashinki-hwan), acupuncture, and moxibation. To evaluate the results of this treatment, we used a numeric rating scale (NRS), the manual muscle test (MMT), the National Cancer Institute Common Toxicity Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE), and the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer quality-of-life questionnaire about CIPN (EORTC-QLQ-CIPN20). After 49 days of treatment, the NRS scores decreased for bilateral limb pain and tingling, for bilateral lower leg and hand cold sensation, and for fatigue. The MMT results for the upper and lower extremities were improved. CTCAE Grade and EORTC QLQ-CIPN20 score were also decreased. Conclusion: According to these results, Korean medicine treatment may be considered an effective treatment for CIPN. Prospective studies are needed in the future to confirm and expand these findings.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.36 no.5
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• pp.175-180
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• 2022

The seeds of Trichosanthes kirilowii (STK) used in traditional Oriental medicine for the treatment of dry cough and constipation have diverse pharmacological activities, including hypolipidemic, antioxidant, immunosuppressive, and anticancer effects. However, the effect of STK on angiogenesis has not been studied yet. In this study, we investigated whether the ethanolic extract of STK (ESTK) can regulate the migration and tube formation of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) and explored the underlying mechanism. Results of transwell assay showed that ESTK treatment dose-dependently suppressed the migration of HUVECs. The conditioned medium collected from H1299 human lung cancer cells was used as a chemoattractant. Our observation suggests that ESTK would inhibit the recruitment of endothelial cells into tumors. In addition, ESTK treatment significantly reduced the tube formation of HUVECs. As a molecular mechanism, we found that vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF)-induced phosphorylation of VEGF receptor 2 (VEGFR2) was completely blocked by ESTK treatment. The expression of angiogenic factors, including VEGFA, fibroblast growth factor 2 (FGF2), angiopoietin, placental growth factor (PGF), platelet derived growth factor (PDGF), angiogenin, and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α, was commonly decreased by ESTK treatment in H1299 cells, indicating that ESTK would reduce the production of angiogenic factors from cancer cells. Taken together, our results clearly demonstrated that ESTK exhibited anti-angiogenic effects in HUVECs, which provides another possible mechanism underlying the anticancer activities of STK.

• BMB Reports
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• v.52 no.1
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• pp.35-41
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• 2019

Cellular senescence, a permanent state of cell cycle arrest, is believed to have originally evolved to limit the proliferation of old or damaged cells. However, it has been recently shown that cellular senescence is a physiological and pathological program contributing to embryogenesis, immune response, and wound repair, as well as aging and age-related diseases. Unlike replicative senescence associated with telomere attrition, premature senescence rapidly occurs in response to various intrinsic and extrinsic insults. Thus, cellular senescence has also been considered suppressive mechanism of tumorigenesis. Current studies have revealed that therapy-induced senescence (TIS), a type of senescence caused by traditional cancer therapy, could play a critical role in cancer treatment. In this review, we outline the key features and the molecular pathways of cellular senescence. Better understanding of cellular senescence will provide insights into the development of powerful strategies to control cellular senescence for therapeutic benefit. Lastly, we discuss existing strategies for the induction of cancer cell senescence to improve efficacy of anticancer therapy.

• Korean Journal of Oriental Medicine
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.81-86
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• 2008

Objective: This study was aimed to review the recent trends of complementary medicine research in ICCMR 2008. Methods: Analyzed data include all researches of both oral and poster presentations in ICCMR. We classified presented researches according to their treatment method, nations, and targeted diseases. Results: In total, 338 researches were presented. In terms of methods, 68 basic researches, 98 clinical trials, 55 commentaries, 46 reviews, 71 trend analysis papers were classified. Herbal medicine was the most common treatment for research in ICCMR. And in terms of nation. Australia's announcement was the most in ICCMR. Lastly, cancer was the most focused theme in the conference. Conclusion: In the recent CAM research, cancer, depression and stress are the most targeted diseases since they are difficult to cure in modern medicine and since patients have high hopes to overcome their state by CAM. This review will help Korean doctors or scientists to systematically understand traditional medicine and to develop their researches.

• Journal of Korean Traditional Oncology
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.25-31
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• 2017

Objectives: This case report presents improvement after receiving acupuncture treatment for a chemotherapy-induced stomatitis. Methods: The patient was treated for 6 times with acupuncture. And effects of treatments were measured with the World Health Organization (WHO) oral toxicity scale and Visual Analogue Scale (VAS). Results: The clinical symptoms of the stomatitis were improved that WHO oral toxicity scale decreased from grade 4 to grade 0 and Visual Analogue Scale decreased from 7 to 2 after treated with acupuncture. Conclusions: In this study, acupuncture might be effective way to cure the cancer patient suffering from chemotherapy-induced stomatitis.

• Journal of Korean Traditional Oncology
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.53-59
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• 2009

Background & Objective: Regardless of types of cancer, cancer pain means the pain occurred by tumor itself, caused by complication or side effects during treatment and which is neither directly related to tumor nor treatment. This case was performed to relieve the cancer pain and study the effect of moxibustion to the cancer pain. Method: For 27 days, the patient was treated by moxibustion($MANINA^{(R)}$), acupuncture, herbal medicine and narcotic analgesics. We planned to maintain moxibustion on 8 points of Bladder meridian line(BL13, BL17, BL42, BL43) for 20 minutes. The improvement of the symptom was evaluated by BPI/VAS, and the amount of narcotic analgesics applied. Results: The BPI/VAS was declined and amount of applying narcotic analgesics was decreased. Conclusion: It is suggested that moxibustion on BL13, BL17, BL42, BL43 is useful to relief of cancer pain in left flank area.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.43 no.3
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• pp.257-264
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• 2010

Objectives: An accurate estimation of cancer patients is the basis of epidemiological studies and health services. However in Korea, cancer patients visiting out-patient clinics are usually ruled out of such studies and so these studies are suspected of underestimating the cancer patient population. The purpose of this study is to construct a more complete, hospital-based cancer patient registry using multiple sources of medical information. Methods: We constructed a cancer patient detection algorithm using records from various sources that were obtained from both the in-patients and out-patients seen at Asan Medical Center (AMC) for any reason. The medical data from the potentially incident cancer patients was reviewed four months after first being detected by the algorithm to determine whether these patients actually did or did not have cancer. Results: Besides the traditional practice of reviewing the charts of in-patients upon their discharge, five more sources of information were added for this algorithm, i.e., pathology reports, the national severe disease registry, the reason for treatment, prescriptions of chemotherapeutic agents and radiation therapy reports. The constructed algorithm was observed to have a PPV of 87.04%. Compared to the results of traditional practice, 36.8% of registry failures were avoided using the AMC algorithm. Conclusions: To minimize loss in the cancer registry, various data sources should be utilized, and the AMC algorithm can be a successful model for this. Further research will be required in order to apply novel and innovative technology to the electronic medical records system in order to generate new signals from data that has not been previously used.

• Journal of Ginseng Research
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• v.46 no.2
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• pp.266-274
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• 2022

Colon cancer, the third most frequent occurred cancer, has high mortality and extremely poor prognosis. Ginsenoside, the active components of traditional Chinese herbal medicine Panax ginseng, exerts antitumor effect in various cancers, including colon cancer. However, the detailed molecular mechanism of Ginsenoside in the tumor suppression have not been fully elucidated. Here, we chose the representative ginsenoside Rg3 and reported for the first time that Rg3 induces mitophagy in human colon cancer cells, which is responsible for its anticancer effect. Rg3 treatment leads to mitochondria damage and the formation of mitophagosome; when autophagy is inhibited, the clearance of damaged mitochondria can be reversed. Next, our results showed that Rg3 treatment activates the PINK1-Parkin signaling pathway and recruits Parkin and ubiquitin proteins to mitochondria to induce mitophagy. GO analysis of Parkin targets showed that Parkin interacts with a large number of mitochondrial proteins and regulates the molecular function of mitochondria. The cellular energy metabolism enzyme GAPDH is validated as a novel substrate of Parkin, which is ubiquitinated by Parkin. Moreover, GAPDH participates in the Rg3-induced mitophagy and regulates the translocation of Parkin to mitochondria. Functionally, Rg3 exerts the inhibitory effect through regulating the nonglycolytic activity of GAPDH, which could be associated with the cellular oxidative stress. Thus, our results revealed GAPDH ubiquitination by Parkin as a crucial mechanism for mitophagy induction that contributes to the tumor-suppressive function of ginsenoside, which could be a novel treatment strategy for colon cancer.

• THE JOURNAL OF KOREAN ORIENTAL ONCOLOGY
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.99-108
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• 2003

Recently, the proportion of the population older has increased rapidly. As the aged population is increasing, the prevalence of malignancy rises with age, too. We believe that the potential benefits of approach to cancer care in the elderly are self-evident. In order to investigate the characteristics of cancer in the elderly, we reviewed literature related with the biology of the aged with cancer. The elderly undergo age-related changes in their physiology which may result in altered tolerance to disease and to the requirements of the management of illness. The possible reasons for the increased prevalence of cancer in the elderly are a longer potential duration of exposure to carcinogens, a reduced ability of repair DNA and reduced host defences against malignancy. In general, cancer patients in the elderly have a shorter survival. Because it is impossible to offer the active treatment of cancer in the elderly. Also, they have the problems that the psychosocial change and reduce of physiological function such as absorption, metabolism and excretion. We hope that other groups will further research cancer in the elderly in future.