Drug Repurposing: The Mechanisms and Signaling Pathways of Anti-Cancer Effects of Anesthetics
Abstract
Cancer is one of the leading causes of death worldwide. There are only limited treatment strategies that can be applied to treat cancer, including surgical resection, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy, but these have only limited effectiveness. Developing a new drug for cancer therapy is protracted, costly, and inefficient. Recently, drug repurposing has become a rising research field to provide new meaning for an old drug. By searching a drug repurposing database ReDO_DB, a brief list of anesthetic/sedative drugs, such as haloperidol, ketamine, lidocaine, midazolam, propofol, and valproic acid, are shown to possess anti-cancer properties. Therefore, in the current review, we will provide a general overview of the anti-cancer mechanisms of these anesthetic/sedative drugs and explore the potential underlying signaling pathways and clinical application of these drugs applied individually or in combination with other anti-cancer agents.
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Lidocaine promoted ferroptosis in ovarian and breast cancer
Lidocaine inhibits melanoma cell proliferation
Lidocaine induce apoptosis in osteosarcoma tumor cells
Lidocaine inhibits cervical cancer cell proliferation and induces cell apoptosis
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Lidocaine inhibits the progression of retinoblastoma in vitro and in vivo
