How to protect heart from damaging effects of cancer treatment

What is it about?

Cardiac toxicity is damage to the heart from the drugs which were given to kill cancer cells as a part of your cancer treatment. A side effect of these therapies is that the normal cells in and around your heart can also be killed there by causing cardiomyopathy or weakening of the heart. This paper investigated all the randomized studies assessing the role of beta blockers in cancer therapy induced cardiomyopathy. Chemotherapy-induced cardiotoxicity incorporates multiple cardiovascular manifestations and is mostly characterized by an asymptomatic decline in the left ventricular ejection fraction. Cardioprotective treatments are few, which include beta blockers. This study is an important addition to the existing limited literature in this field and clearly illustrates the cardioprotective role of beta blockers in cancer patients. Our study suggested that larger scale randomized studies are needed to improve clinical practice and reduce the risk of morbidity and mortality from chemotherapy-induced cardiotoxicity in these cancer survivors.

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Why is it important?

This study showed that beta blockers are protective and not only led to significant improvement in survival in these cancer patients but also were noted to help prevent cardiac dysfunction in these patients. With the advancements in the field of cancer therapies and increased identification of chemotherapy related cardiac toxicity in these patients, a relatively new discipline has emerged, called cardio-oncology with the goal of a strong collaboration of a cardiologist and an oncologist to guide treatment plan in cancer patients to avoid or decrease the risk of cardiotoxicity while at the same time, maximize the cancer therapy options. This study also had a broader impact in this emerging field of cardio-oncology aligning both the cardiologists and oncologists to come together for the need of more research in this area cardioprotective effects of beta blockers in these patients.