New drug combination could prevent head and neck cancer in high-risk patients

A new drug combination shows promise in reducing the risk for patients with advanced oral precancerous lesions to develop squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck. The results of the study, which included preclinical and clinical analyses, were published in Clinical Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.

"Squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck (SCCHN) is the most common type of head and neck cancer," said Dong Moon Shin, professor of hematology, medical oncology and otolaryngology at Emory University School of Medicine, USA, and director of the Cancer Chemoprevention Program at Winship Cancer Institute at Emory University in Atlanta. "The survival rate for patients with SCCHN is very poor. An effective prevention approach is desperately needed, especially since we can identify patients who are at extremely high risk: those with advanced oral precancerous lesions," he noted.

Based on prior research suggesting a role for epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) and cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) in promoting SCCHN, Shin and colleagues believed combining an EGFR inhibitor and a COX-2 inhibitor could provide an effective chemopreventive approach.