The Potential Roles Of The Capsule "Aifukang" In Multi-drug Resistance Occurrence In Brest Carcinoma After Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy

Through analysis of the proteins P-gp, LRP and GST-πexpressed in tumor tissues of breast cancer patients, the study investigated the capsule Aifukang(short for AFK) derived from Chinese medicine for its potential roles involved in multi-drug resistance occurrence during chemotherapy with anthracycline drugs. The research provided experimental evidence supporting and explaining the ideology that Chinese medicine integrated into chemotherapy reduces adversity and improves the outcome of treatment.53 cases of breast cancer patients pathologically and histologically diagnosed by coarse needle biopsies were collected from TCM of Guangdong Province and the 1st affiliated hospital of Guangzhou University of TOM from April 2004 to November 2006. Gene products P170, LPR, NRP and GST, by means of Immunohistochemical assays, were detected in paraffin-embedded specimens. Statistical analysis approaches such as t test, rank-sum test, chi-square test and descriptive analysis were undertaken to assess therapeutic effects and analyze the expression level of drug resistance proteins to explore the regulatory roles of AFK in MDR gene expression for patients given chemotherapy.Baselines between the AFK group(AFK was given during chemotherapy) and non-AFK group had no significant differences in age, pathological findings and history of menstruation, lactation, chemotherapy treatment and exposure to risk factors(P＞0.05). Three as significant difference of chemotherapeutic effects between the two groups(P＜0.05). LRP expression in tumor tissues had abundant expression(81.7%) while MPR kept a lower level of 5.7%, though no significant inter-group difference was found(P＞0.05). AFK demonstrated regulation upon the MDR expression and P170 expression with significant inter-group differences(P＜0.05), however no such difference was found in the expres ion of MRP, GST-πand LRP(P＞0.05).The study investigated the intervening role of AFK in MDR gene expressions during chemotherapy and found that MPR had no strong tie to MDR formation with a low level of expression 5.7%, however LRP maintained a high expression level of 81.7% and was considered the major cause of MDR.The difference of chemotherapeutic effects between the two groups was significant(P＜0.05), it showed that AFK maybe can increase the chemotherapeutic effects. Inter-group difference of P170(P＜0.05), a drug resistant protein was found indicating AFK's inhibitory effect on the protein expression.