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Dear Dr. Takimoto:
Thank you for sharing the information on the upcoming First Annual Meeting on
the Experimental Therapeutics for Human Cancer.
While it certainly looks like a very exciting program, and two days is a very
limited amount of time to cover such an extensive topic, I have some concers,
especially from a pharmacokinetic viewpoint, about the emphasis of the topics
listed so far in the program.
I see no section listed that will review and discuss some of the key
pharmacokinetic and pathophysiological aspects of drug delivery and
targeting. While molecular processes are certainly crucial of whether a drug
will act AFTER it has reached the tumor cell, one of the most frustrating
aspects in cancer chemotherapy are the difficulties and the barriers
resulting from TRANSPORT processes in the living system. And the ability of
anticancer drugs to exert their effects, however excellent they may be in a
model-system, is uniquely dependent on the ability of that drug to be
delivered effectively to the target (effector) site. What is more, the
inherent heterogeneity of human tumors is such that even multiple lesions in
the same patient may exhibit different transport behaviour, and such
characterics will also change with time.
Noninvasive imaging methods (pharmacokinetic imaging and functional imaging)
are ideally suited for measuring the unique properties of human tumors, and
when they are integrated into the development of new drugs or into the
treatment of patients with existing drugs, may allow a much more effective
selection of strategies that will hopefully optimize the effectiveness of
that drug. And failure to acquire such information may preclude drugs that
have high activity in developmental studies from achieving their potential in
human studies, if the underlying pharmacokinetic characteristics of that
human tumor are not considered.
I urge you and the organizers of this very interesting meeting to add at
least a section that will address tumoral pharmacokinetics and tumoral
pathophysiology.
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| Professor Walter Wolf, Ph.D. E-Mail: wwolfw.aaa.hsc.usc.edu |
| Director, Pharmacokinetic Imaging Program |
| Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences Telephone: 213-342-1405 |
| University of Southern California Fax: 213-342-9804 |
| 1985 Zonal Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90033 |
| |
|Center for Noninvasive Pharmacology, Los Angeles Oncologic Institute|
| MRI at St. Vincent Medical Center Telephone: 213-484-7235 |
| 2131 Third St., Los Angeles, CA 90057 Fax: 213-484-7447 |
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