Stress Hormones, Reawakened Dormant Cancer Cells

Cancer is one of the diseases that need ample attention to have it be treated and recover earnestly. Because technology and knowledge add up to the experts, some treatments are available for cancer patients, but experts often recommend immunotherapy. Another one is surgery to physically remove the organ's tumors or remove it from various areas if the tumors already spread. 

In most cases, even though the cancer cells are removed from the body, cancer can still recur and devastate the survivor's cancer-free life. According to New Atlas, the recurrence of cancer happens when dormant tumor cells reawaken. They added that the reason for the reawakening of this 'sleepin' tumor cells is unknown. Now, a collaborative study by various researchers led by Michela Perego, Ph.D., discovers that high levels of stress hormone can trigger dormant tumor cells to reactivate and cause cancer that can impair the life of a once survivor of the disease. 

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What are dormant tumor cells?

According to Cancer Research UK, cancer coming back after years of successful treatment is due to some cancer cells' dormancy or the cells' hibernation state. In an interview with Cancer Research UK, a colorectal cancer expert, Simon Buckzaki, MA (Cantab), MB, BChir, Ph.D., FRCS, said that dormancy means that the cancer tumor cell is not dividing. He emphasized that cancer cells are known for rapid division and promulgation that why behaving this way - not dividing and just simply sitting somewhere - is weird. 

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Stress hormone and dormant cancer cells

According to Stat News, the hormone norepinephrine is released into the bloodstream when the body detects a higher stress level. They added that the researcher could also find that higher-level norepinephrine triggered neutrophils' activation in some cancer models, which is the shield of tumors that makes them undetectable by immune cells kills the cancer cells during immunotherapy. The researchers also noted in Stat News that when the neutrophils activate, these cells release a type of lipid that acts as the dormant cells' alarm clock, making them active once again. Dr. Perego said in an interview with Stat news that these phenomena are chains of events that are very powerful to end the hibernation of the cancer cells. 

According to New Atlas, Dr. Perego and her team observed 80 lung cancer patients in which 17 of the participants have already have a relapse. According to the team, the participants who had the early recurrence of the disease have higher blood levels of the lipid compared to the patients who have a longer time before their cancer came back. 

Does this mean cancer patients should not have stress?

This might be true that outside forces' stress may be harmful to a person, especially cancer patients. But the researchers stress that stress from outside and stress hormones are not the same. According to the researchers, as published by Stat News, stress hormones are needed by the dormant cancer cells for them to reawaken. The researchers also added that stress alone does not reawaken the cancer cells, but they emphasized that neutrophils should be activated to produce lipids. From there, the dormant cancer cells will awaken. 

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