Drug for osteoporosis may benefit prostate cancer patients

A drug typically used to treat osteoporosis has a potential clinical benefit in treating men with prostate cancer, according to researchers at the Louis Warschaw Prostate Cancer Center at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles.

“We undertook this study because we desperately need new therapies for patients with advanced prostate cancer,” said David B. Agus, MD, principal investigator.

In the study, which is published in the British Journal of Urology International (2006; 97:691-7), patients were given a daily oral dosage of raloxifene (Evista), and the disease and its symptoms were followed on a regular basis. Some patients showed evidence of disease stabilization manifested by a slowing or stopping of the growth of their prostate cancer.

“The outcome from the phase II clinical trial merits further study in a randomized clinical trial to demonstrate the clinical benefit of this targeted therapy,” said Ronald L. Shazer, MD, primary author of the manuscript.