Managing Metastatic Pancreatic Cancer with Chemotherapy and Diet
Can a diet deficient in three amino acids help slow the growth of advanced pancreatic cancer?
Proliferating cancer cells fuel their rapid growth and division through various mechanisms, including by hijacking and reprogramming a person’s glucose and lipid metabolism systems. Researchers are also looking at aberrant amino acids metabolism as another factor that could contribute to tumor growth, invasion, metastasis, angiogenesis, immunosuppression, and chemoresistance.
This clinical trial aims to determine if a medical diet that restricts three nonessential amino acids (proline, serine, and glycine) could impact pancreatic cancer growth when paired with standard chemotherapy.
More About this Study
The study is open to newly diagnosed metastatic pancreatic adenocarcinoma patients. All participants will receive specially formulated food as well as chemotherapy with the gemcitabine and Abraxane drug combination.
The study has several sites open throughout the country, but participants who are far from a trial site can continue to see their local oncologist for chemotherapy. These patients will receive home-delivered meals and in-home visits/telehealth communication with the study team of doctors and nurses.
The six-month study will evaluate the tolerability of the treatment and track markers of pancreatic cancer in its participants.
We encourage you to consult your physicians for clinical trials that may be right for you. The website ClinicalTrials.gov provides more details about this trial as well as many others. Patients can sign up at the sponsor website. You can visit the EmergingMed Trial Finder for a list of all active pancreatic cancer clinical trials.