The CancerWeb Report, What's New In Cancer: January, 1997
Testicular germ cell cancer

• Silibinin protects against kidney damage from cisplatin or ifosfamide - Treatment of testicular cancer remains one of the most successful achievements of chemotherapy, but the drugs used, notably cisplatin and ifosfamide, are associated with kidney damage which may be both severe and long-lasting. German researchers at the University of Tubingen, reported in the December, 1996 issue of the British Journal of Cancer, that the compound silibinin protects rats against the kidney toxicity of cisplatin and ifosfamide in rats, while appearing not to affect the antitumor activity of these drugs against tumor cells. A clinical trial of silibinin is already underway. (Bokemeyer, Br J Cancer 74:2036, 1996)