A study of a possible cancer cure by correcting the main cancer-related psychoneuroendocrine alterations responsible for tumor-related immunosuppression

Abstract

It is known since more than 50 years that the pineal gland plays a fundamental anticancer physiological role by releasing hormones capable of counteract cancer growth by either inhibiting cancer cell proliferation, or stimulating the antitumor immunity, as well as that cancer progression is constantly associated with a progressive decline in the pineal endocrine function. Despite the well demonstrated antitumor activity of the pineal gland and the complete absence of biological toxicity and the low cost of the antitumor pineal molecules, surprisingly very few clinical studies have been carried out up to now with pineal hormones in the treatment of human neoplasms, at least in patients, for whom no other conventional anticancer therapy may be available. The present study was carried out to evaluate the therapeutic effects of a pineal endocrine substitution therapy with high-dose melatonin (MLT) alone (n=68), MLT plus 5-methoxytryptamine (5-MTT) (n=72) or MLT plus 5-MTT plus pinealine (PNL) (n=28) in 168 untreatable metastatic solid tumor patients with life expectancy less than 1 year. A survival longer than 1 year was achieved in 72/168 (43%), and both objective tumor regression rate and 1-year survival observed in patients treated with MLT plus other pineal hormones were higher than in patiente treated by MLT alone, without, however, statistically significant differences. On the contrary, the percentage of disease control (DC) obtained by MLT plus other pineal molecules was significanly higher than that achieved by MLT alone. The clinical status improved in most patients. Finally, lymphocyte count and lymphocyte-to-monocyte ratio enhanced in patients with DC, whereas a further decline occurred in patients with PD. This preliminary study show that a pineal endocrine therapy may improve the prognosis of metastatic cancer patients, including those for whom no other standard anticancer therapy is available, and that the control of the neoplastic disease may be further enhanced by associating to MLT other less investigated antitumor pineal hormones. *Correspondence to: Paolo Lissoni, Institute of Biological Medicine, Milan, Italy, E-mail: paolo.lissoni@gmx.com