University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro, Department of Veterinary Sciences , Vila Real , Portugal.
Expert Opin Drug Discov. 2014 May;9(5):485-503. doi: 10.1517/17460441.2014.902930. Epub 2014 Mar 26.
Urinary bladder cancer is a major human malignancy that afflicts millions of people worldwide every year. Urinary bladder cancer is usually superficial at presentation in 70 - 80% of patients. In these cases, a simple transurethral resection is adequate for removing the tumor. However, some patients experience recurrence or even tumor progression. In another 20 - 30% of patients, muscle-invasive carcinoma is diagnosed. Despite all the developments in this area, even today, the options for treatment of urinary bladder cancer remain inadequate. The search for the mechanisms involved in human urinary bladder cancer and for new and improved treatment methods has led to the development of many experimental models using laboratory animals over the past 40 years.
In this review, the authors provide a concise overview of the animal models used to study urinary bladder cancer. Furthermore, the authors discuss their advantages and disadvantages with regard to the search for new therapeutic approaches.
The use of urinary bladder cancer models for understanding the mechanisms involved in tumors' response to new treatments is an important step in the drug discovery process. However, the authors believe that it will be necessary to develop our knowledge and understanding of the molecular processes underlying urothelial chemical carcinogenesis for us to better evaluate the efficacy of novel therapeutics.
膀胱癌是一种严重的人类恶性肿瘤，每年在全球范围内影响数百万人。70-80%的膀胱癌患者在发病时为浅表性肿瘤。在这些情况下，单纯经尿道膀胱肿瘤切除术即可充分切除肿瘤。然而，部分患者会出现复发甚至肿瘤进展。另有 20-30%的患者被诊断为肌层浸润性膀胱癌。尽管该领域取得了诸多进展，但时至今日，膀胱癌的治疗方案仍显不足。为了探寻人类膀胱癌相关的作用机制，并开发新的、更有效的治疗方法，过去 40 年来，研究人员利用实验动物建立了许多实验模型。
在这篇综述中，作者简要概述了用于膀胱癌研究的动物模型。此外，作者还讨论了这些模型在寻找新治疗方法方面的优缺点。
使用膀胱癌模型来了解肿瘤对新治疗方法的反应机制是药物发现过程中的重要步骤。然而，作者认为，为了更好地评估新型治疗药物的疗效，我们有必要进一步加深对尿路上皮化学致癌作用的分子过程的认识和理解。
