In vivo effects of tumor necrosis factor-alpha or flavone acetic acid in combination with doxorubicin on multidrug-resistant B16 melanoma.

Having observed that tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-alpha and doxorubicin (DXR) produce a synergistic inhibition of melanoma B16 and also of its multidrug resistant (MDR) variant in vitro, we tested whether this interaction would occur in vivo as well. C57BL/6 mice with s.c. tumors were treated with TNF or flavone acetic acid (FAA), a biological response modifier, in simultaneous or sequential combination with DXR. The agents were administered systemically. Overall, the results were negative, apart from a trend towards slight synergy, found in the chemosensitive melanoma, when TNF was given 1 or 2 days before DXR. The effects of FAA and DXR were found to be subadditive or antagonistic. However, an encouraging new finding was that FAA has significant inhibitory effects on the MDR B16 melanoma.