It has now been determined that
antisense therapy which reduces the expression of TRPM-2 provides therapeutic benefits in the treatment of
cancer. In particular, such
antisense therapy can be applied in treatment of
prostate cancer and renal
cell cancer. Addition of antisense TRPM-2 ODN to prostatic
tumor cells in vivo is effective for delaying the onset of
androgen independence. Thus,
prostate cancer can be treated in an individual suffering from
prostate cancer by initiating
androgen-withdrawal to induce
apoptotic cell death of prostatic
tumor cells in the individual, and administering to the individual a composition effective to inhibit expression of TRPM-2 by the
tumor cells, thereby delaying the progression of prostatic tumor cells to an
androgen-independent state in an individual
Combined use of antisense TRPM-2 and taxanes synergistically enhances cytotoxic chemosensitivity of androgen-independent
prostate cancer. In addition, it has also been found that antisense TRPM-2 has beneficial effect for other cancer types. Specifically, antisense TRPM-2 ODN enhances chemosensitivity in human Renal
cell cancer, a normally chemoresistant
disease with no active chemotherapeutic agent having an objective response rate higher than 10%.
Radiation sensitivity is also enhanced when cells expressing TRPM-2 are treated with antisense TRPM-2 ODN. Thus, the antisense TRPM-2 ODNs can be used to enhance
hormone sensitivity, chemosensitivity and
radiation sensitivity of a variety of cancer types in which expression of TRPM-2 has been observed.