Paclitaxel

Ok, so what's this Paclitaxel thing?

Paclitaxel is an anti-cancer drug. It is poorly absorbed in the body so most of the times, it will be attached to a transporting pro-moiety to enhance it's absorption and bioavailability, so that it will be able to reach the tumour tissue at a high enough concentration to exert its action.

So how does it work? Basically, cancer simply means the tissue is growing rapidly and in an uncoordinated manner. It does not respond to our body's feedback mechanism (that is "stop signal"), instead, it just goes on multiplying until a lump of tissue becomes apparent and destructive to the body. This Paclitaxel works by inhibiting the multiplication of the tumour tissue. So it prevents the tissue from growing and expanding beyond its boundaries.

So why is it so important to prevent the tissue from multiplying? It is because if a tumour, which is initially benign, multiply to an extent that the tissues become very different from the original one, there is a huge possibility that the benign tumour will transform into a malignant tumour, that is the cancer. And the greatest complication that can arise is that part of the tissue will detach from the original site, carried by the blood and deposit to some other body parts and start to grow again, as a malignant tumour.

So do you think an anti-cancer drug can really treat cancer? As a pharmacist, you'll always be asking your patient to be compliant and to take the drug dutifully. Because you've learnt how the drug works and how it can alleviate the patient's condition. But then, do you know taking anticancer drug is an unbearable experience too? The cytotoxic effect, the adverse effects the drug bring may be more painful that the tumour itself. Your immune system weakens, many infections attack you, you feel nausea, and gastrointestinal disturbances etc.. the side effects go on and on. The patient may even choose to give up.

And do you think it's wrong?

I feel that there's no right and wrong in this case, simply because you're not the patient, and don't even think of saying "i understand how you feel" because you won't. The mere imagining part from your side is far from the reality she is facing too.