Guide To Treating Waldenstrom Macroglobulinemia

Targeted Therapy

Targeted therapy involves the use of certain drugs to target specific changes that only take place inside of cancerous cells. Because targeted therapy drugs work through the use of a different mechanism than chemotherapy drugs do, there are some circumstances where they may work when chemotherapy does not. There are three main types of targeted therapy drugs that can be used to effectively treat Waldenstrom macroglobulinemia patients. Proteasome inhibitors are targeted therapy drugs that keep the proteins in the cell that are responsible for controlling cell division from being broken down by proteasomes or enzyme complexes. MTOR inhibitors are a kind of targeted therapy drugs that work by targeting and deactivating the mTOR protein responsible for helping the cell grow and divide. Bruton tyrosine kinase inhibitors are a type of targeted therapy drug that works by stopping a protein called BTK that is responsible for helping the cancerous cells survive. Most targeted therapy drugs have less severe side effects than chemotherapy.