THE DOUBLE ROLE OF INFLAMMATION IN THE EMERGENCE OF CANCEROUS LESIONS

Abstract

This review demonstrated that in the same way the immune cells act to repair the affected tissues, cancer cells produce disorderly inflammation factors to sustain growth and development of the tumor. They produce exaggeratedly the same inflammatory substances such as cytokines, prostaglandins and leukotrienes, which usually play the natural tissue repair. The cancer uses those substances to induce its own proliferation and to make permeable barriers surrounding it. Then the process that allows the immune system to repair damage and to destroy aggressors in all reaches of the body is skewed in favor of cancerous cells. And due to inflammation, such cells will infiltrate through surrounding tissues, penetrate into lymphatic and blood flow until give rise to metastases. The excess of these inflammatory substances in the surrounding tissues, leads to blockage of a natural process called apoptosis, or genetically programmed cell suicide, thereby contributing to the uncontrolled proliferation of tissues. Cancerous cells are thus protected from cell destruction, and the tumor will increasingly gaining size and body. DESCRIPTORS Inflammation. Cancer. Immunology.