Satti Jahangir
Department of Radiation Oncology, Albany Medical Center, 43 New Scotland Ave., Albany, NY 12208-3478, USA.
Dose Response. 2009 Mar 24;7(3):208-20. doi: 10.2203/dose-response.08-010.Satti.
Generally minute doses of drugs have been prescribed in biotherapies, homeopathy, immunization and vaccinations for centuries. Now the use of low doses of drugs is on the rise to combat serious diseases such as advanced cancers around the world. This new therapeutic approach to address solid tumors and other advanced diseases is a departure from the conventional use of maximum dose protocol. A small dose of the prescribed drug is frequently administered in a continuous fashion, at regular intervals, either as a standard treatment or as a maintenance therapy for a long time. However, this new treatment method lacks any standard for drug quantization, dose fractionation, repetition frequency and duration of a treatment course for an individual patient. This paper reviews literature about metronomic therapy and discusses hormesis: both phenomena occur in low dose ranges. Better mathematical models, computer simulations, process optimization and clinical trials are warranted to fully exploit the potential of low dose metronomic therapy to cure chronic and complicated diseases. New protocols to standardize metronomic dosimetry will answer the age old questions related to hormesis and homeopathy. It appears that this new low-dose metronomic therapy will have far reaching effects in curing chronic diseases throughout the world.
几个世纪以来，生物疗法、顺势疗法、免疫疗法和疫苗接种中通常使用小剂量药物。现在，低剂量药物的使用在全球范围内呈上升趋势，用于对抗诸如晚期癌症等严重疾病。这种针对实体瘤和其他晚期疾病的新治疗方法与传统的最大剂量方案不同。规定剂量的小剂量药物通常以连续方式、定期给药，作为标准治疗或长期维持治疗。然而，这种新的治疗方法缺乏针对个体患者的药物量化、剂量分割、重复频率和疗程持续时间的任何标准。本文回顾了关于节拍疗法的文献并讨论了兴奋效应：这两种现象都发生在低剂量范围内。需要更好的数学模型、计算机模拟、过程优化和临床试验，以充分发挥低剂量节拍疗法治愈慢性和复杂疾病的潜力。标准化节拍剂量测定的新方案将回答与兴奋效应和顺势疗法相关的古老问题。看来这种新的低剂量节拍疗法将在全球治愈慢性病方面产生深远影响。
