Pain killers promote cancer growth

A new study has revealed that common pain relief medication such as morphine can actually encourage the growth and spread of cancer cells.

Opiate-based painkillers have been shown to stimulate cancer growth. Two new studies have shown how shielding lung cancer cells from opiates reduce cell proliferation, invasion and migration in both cell-culture and mouse models.

The researchers focussed on the mu opiate receptor, where morphine works, as a potential therapeutic target.

“If confirmed clinically, this could change how we do surgical anesthesia for our cancer patients,” said Dr Patrick A. Singleton, assistant professor of medicine at the University of Chicago Medical Center and principal author of both studies. READ MORE…