Since I have occasionally suggested Green Tea from the benefits I have received, I thought it was important to get this information out quickly. Of course, please speak with your doctors before starting any complementary treatments and share new research with them such as this. This research indicates that green tea cancels out the benefits of Velcade (bortezomib) and other boronic acid-based proteasome inhibitors. I'm not sure what these are. Regardless, I am considering stopping my green tea consumption.
Unfortunately I don't have access to the full text of the journal article yet and only can access the abstract. As a result I could not find out how the green tea was administered (pill vs. drinking), and if it was administered during the chemo treatment (i.e. with the Velcade or only during the non-chemo days). If anyone has access to the article and can provide this information I would be interested.
After discussions with my oncologist, I did not take the green tea pills, or take green tea during the chemo treatment days (waiting at least 3 days on either side of the treatment). Now I wonder if I should wait until I stop chemo (if and when that happens). I believe my doctor was concerned not to overtax the kidney, since the Melphalan is processed through the kidneys. I don't know about the Velcade.
Talk to your oncologist first and share this new information! The information on the research is below. There sounds like there will be some new research on green tea helping treatment in the future and I will be looking forward to that research as well.
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ScienceDaily (2009-02-05) -- Contrary to popular assumptions about the health benefits of green tea, researchers have found that the widely used supplement renders a cancer drug used to treat multiple myeloma and mantle cell lymphoma completely ineffective in treating cancer.
The research findings are part of a larger project run by the team called "Yin-Yang Properties of Green Tea Extract in Combination Cancer Chemotherapy: From Encouragingly Beneficial to Dangerously Detrimental."
"Obviously, the combination of GTE or EGCG with Velcade is an example of 'dangerously detrimental,' "Schönthal says. "But we are also studying another well-established chemotherapeutic drug, where the inclusion of EGCG appears to yield an 'encouragingly beneficial' outcome, which is more in line with our original expectation that GTE should be beneficial, not detrimental."
Access the science daily post at:http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/02/090203162355.htm#
The Blood Journal reference:
Encouse B. Golden, Philip Y. Lam, Adel Kardosh, Kevin J. Gaffney, Enrique Cadenas, Stan G. Louise, Nicos A. Petasis, Thomas C. Chen, Axel H. Schönthal. Green Tea Polyphenols Block The Anticancer Effects of Bortezomib And Other Boronic Acid-Based Proteasome Inhibitors. Blood, Feb 3, 2009 DOI: 10.1182/blood-2008-07-171389
Update Feb. 7th:
Thanks to the International Myeloma Foundation for making this article available at:
http://myeloma.org/main.jsp?source=link&source_link_id=3793&type=article&tab_id=1&menu_id=0&id=2511
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