Statin-induced molecular mechanisms of breast cancer cell death: Recent developments

Although drugs like doxorubicin, tamoxifen and herceptin are widely employed in breast cancer therapy, they are known to cause side effects such as cardio-toxicity, endometrial cancer and congestive heart failure respectively. Treatment of triple negative breast cancer (TNBC) is still challenging for clinicians and researchers, as most of the patients do not respond to traditional chemotherapeutic approaches. Hence, identification of alternate less toxic forms of drugs is desperately needed to prevent and suppress the breast cancer. Emerging evidence from numerous studies shows encouraging results for the use of statins against many cancers including breast carcinoma. Our recent findings highlight that statins exhibit anti-proliferative and anti-invasive effects in breast cancer cells by altering intracellular iron, nitric oxide and H2O2 levels. Based on the recent advances made in understanding the mechanisms related to statin-mediated breast cancer cell death, more rigorous studies are warranted to employ statins at least as a neoadjuvant therapy to reduce the cancer-related morbidity and mortality.