Anti-Bv8 antibody and metronomic gemcitabine improve pancreatic adenocarcinoma treatment outcome following weekly gemcitabine therapy.

Weekly gemcitabine therapy is the major treatment offered for patients with pancreatic adenocarcinoma cancer; however, relative resistance of tumor cells to chemotherapy, rapid regrowth, and metastasis are the main causes of death within a year. Recently, the daily continuous administration of chemotherapy in low doses--called metronomic chemotherapy (MC)--has been shown to inhibit primary tumor growth and delay metastases in several tumor types; however, its use as a single therapy is still in question due to its moderate therapeutic benefit. Here, we show that the combination of weekly gemcitabine with MC of the same drug delays tumor regrowth and inhibits metastasis in mice implanted orthotopically with pancreatic tumors.