Norcantharidin is the demethylated form of
Cantharidin, which is the active ingredient of the
blister beetle, Mylabris, a long used
Chinese traditional medicine. Though not well publicized outside China,
Norcantharidin is known to possess significant anti-
hepatoma activity, and is relatively free from side effects. In the present study,
glucose oxidation in tumour and liver tissue slices harvested from
hepatoma-bearing animals was quantified by measuring the radioactivity of 14C-labelled CO2 released from 14C-glucose in
oxygen-enriched incubation medium. Results were expressed as a tumour/liver ratio. For comparison, treatments with
Norcantharidin,
Adriamycin and with hepatic artery
ligation were studied. The mean tumour/liver ratio was 4.2 +/- 2.2 in untreated controls, but dropped significantly to 2.3 +/- 0.5 (p < 0.05) with intra-arterial
Norcantharidin (0.5 mg/kg) and to 2.3 +/- 0.7 (p < 0.05) with intra-arterial
Adriamycin (2.4 mg/kg), and to 2.2 +/- 0.7 (p < 0.05) with hepatic artery
ligation. However, with intravenous
Adriamycin at 2.4 mg/kg, the mean tumour/liver ratio was reduced to only 3.5 +/- 2.0 and was not significantly different from untreated controls. It is concluded that intra-arterial
Norcantharidin is as effective as intraarterial
Adriamycin and hepatic artery
ligation in suppressing tumour
glucose oxidative metabolism. These result simply that
Norcantharidin may have a role to play in the
chemotherapy of primary
liver cancer.