SPECTRE: A trial to test if statins can help control advanced prostate cancer

Grant information

Researcher – Professor Hing Leung
Institution - University of Glasgow
Grant award - £463,460
Duration - 2015-2019
Status - Complete
Reference – PG14-009-TR2

Why did we fund this project?

• New treatments are urgently needed for advanced prostate cancer that is resistant to hormone therapy.
• Professor Hing Leung’s team have shown that cholesterol can help prostate cancer grow rapidly.
• Statins are a type of drug that lowers the amount of cholesterol in the blood. They are commonly used to treat people at high risk of heart disease.
• By blocking off the supply of cholesterol, the team predict that statins might be able to slow the growth of prostate cancer.
• Some studies looking at health data from lots of men with prostate cancer have suggested that men who take statins for heart disease have a lower risk of their cancer spreading and coming back after treatment.
• In this project Professor Hing Leung and team carried out a clinical trial to test whether statins could help control prostate cancer that has become resistant to hormone therapy.

What did the team do?

• The team first recruited a small number of men with prostate cancer who had become resistant to treatment. These men were given statins alongside hormone therapy.
• They decided that if multiple men in this first small trial responded to statins, they would continue to recruit more men to make this a larger trial.
• They took blood samples to measure the men’s PSA levels to see how well they were responding.

What did the team achieve?

• The team found fewer men than anticipated responded to statins. As such, the team decided not to recruit more men to the trial.
• Half of the men in the trial showed some evidence of their prostate cancer stabilising, as the rise in their PSA levels slowed down.
• Interestingly, the team found that men who were stabilised by this treatment showed changes to the way their body processed an important chemicals called tryptophan. The team think this could be an important clue to how statins might work in prostate cancer.

What does this mean for men?

• The team found that whilst a small number of men with hormone-resistant prostate cancer benefitted from statins, many men did not respond to the treatment. As a result, the team are now prioritising other new treatment options.
• However, the team have found an important clue to how statins might work for men with prostate cancer. This could help researchers to work out which men could benefit most from these drugs.