Chemo's collateral damage.

July 25, 2017. Can chemo hold the key to the doorway to distant disease? An interesting study this month in Science shows that chemotherapy not only kills breast tumor cells, but it can also enhance the ability of some malignant cells to migrate out of the primary tumor into blood vessels...and on their way to new frontiers as distant metastases. This is explained by chemo causing a lot of tumor inflammation which recruits macrophages that increase the density and activity of the tumor microenvironment of metastasis (TMEM): the so-called “doorway” to distant metastases. This contributes to our understanding of the incredibly complex tumor microenvironment and hopefully opens the door to future novel approaches to combo therapy.