Chemotherapy

Chemotherapy, in its most general sense, is the treatment of disease by chemicals especially by killing micro-organisms or cancerous cells. In popular usage, it refers to antineoplastic drugs used to treat cancer or the combination of these drugs into a cytotoxic standardized treatment regimen.

What is Chemotherapy?

Chemotherapy literally refers to the treatment of certain diseases using specific chemicals that are destructive to malignant cells or to the causative agent of a disease such as a bacteria or virus. Therefore, the treatment can be broadly divided into two categories - cancer chemotherapy and antimicrobial chemotherapy.

History of Chemotherapy

What is 'Chemo Brain'?

Chemotherapy Types

Does Scalp Cooling Prevent Hair Loss During Chemotherapy?

How Chemotherapy Affects Daily Living

Chemotherapy Treatment Schemes

Chemotherapy Principles

Latest Chemotherapy News and Research

Targeted therapy treats mixed histiocytosis following multiple skull relapses

Mixed histiocytosis (Langerhans cell histiocytosis [LCH] / Erdheim-Chester disease [ECD]) developing after treatment for initial skull LCH is not well recognized.

13 Apr 2026

Targeting senescent fat cells provides new hope for ovarian cancer

Ovarian cancer is the most lethal malignancy of the female reproductive system. Due to its insidious early symptoms and the absence of specific screening modalities, approximately 70% of patients are diagnosed at an advanced stage.

13 Apr 2026

Young cancer survivors face double the risk of later cancers

Survivors of cancer in their teen and young adult years are at double the risk of most types of later cancers, according to research from Alberta published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal) https://www.cmaj.ca/lookup/doi/10.1503/cmaj.251381.

13 Apr 2026

Damon Runyon supports young scientists driving cancer research innovation

The Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation has named 13 new Damon Runyon Fellows, exceptional postdoctoral scientists conducting basic and translational cancer research in the laboratories of leading senior investigators.

11 Apr 2026

Nanomedicine offers targeted solutions for breast cancer treatment

Breast cancer (BCA) is one of the most common cancers worldwide, with high mortality and morbidity in women.

10 Apr 2026

FDA clears investigational new drug application to test sCAR-T therapy for autoimmune conditions

Calibr-Skaggs Institute for Innovative Medicines, the drug discovery division of Scripps Research, announced today that the FDA has cleared their investigational new drug (IND) application to study switchable chimeric antigen receptor T cell (sCAR-T) therapy (CLBR001 + SWI019) in patients with autoimmune conditions.

10 Apr 2026

Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center opens new trial for neuroendocrine tumors

A clinical trial for patients with high-grade neuroendocrine tumors is now open for enrollment at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, part of the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine.

10 Apr 2026

Targeted diet helps reprogram aggressive neuroblastoma in mice

Researchers highlighted how an arginine- and proline-restricted diet combined with eflornithine reprogrammed MYCN-driven neuroblastoma in mice, pushing tumor cells out of the cell cycle and toward differentiation. The commentary argues that this metabolism-to-translation link could open a new path for testing targeted dietary strategies alongside cancer drugs in future clinical studies.

9 Apr 2026

New combination therapy shows safer approach to treating Alzheimer’s disease

A new study finds that combining the current medications for Alzheimer's disease with small molecules derived from micronutrients found in grapes, berries, peanuts and turmeric is a safer and more effective way to treat the disease.

9 Apr 2026

Precision medicine tools offer hope for patients with rare blood cancers

Personalized approaches have dramatically improved outcomes for many patients with non-Hodgkin B-cell lymphomas—blood cancers that arise in immune cells called B cells—yet the same is not true for patients with more rare lymphoma types that originate in immune cells called T cells.

9 Apr 2026

OICR funds four Ontario teams to develop next-generation cancer therapies

Better cancer care depends on better treatment options. That's why the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research (OICR) is supporting four Ontario-based research teams working to develop the next generation of cancer therapies that are designed to be more effective at destroying tumors, have reduced side effects, and make cancer less likely to return.

9 Apr 2026

Insilico Medicine nominates AI-driven drug candidate for cancer, Cushing's syndrome and obesity

The NR3C1 (nuclear receptor subfamily 3 group C member 1) gene encodes the glucocorticoid receptor (GR), a nuclear receptor vital for maintaining physiological homeostasis, and inhibition of NR3C1 could increase the sensitivity of cancer cells to standard chemotherapy, particularly in ovarian cancer.

8 Apr 2026

Clusterin inhibition offers new hope for treating cervical gastric-type adenocarcinoma

Gastric-type adenocarcinoma (GAS) is one of the most aggressive non-human papillomavirus (HPV)-associated cervical adenocarcinomas and remains especially difficult to diagnose and treat.

8 Apr 2026

Study reveals how hyperdiploidy creates rare pre-leukemic clones in children

B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia is the most common form of childhood cancer. In this type of cancer, which affects blood cells, one of the most common abnormalities is the presence of cells with an excess of chromosomes (hyperdiploidy), a condition that leads to chromosomal instability.

8 Apr 2026

Duloxetine fails to prevent nerve damage caused by chemotherapy

A randomized trial conducted by the Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology with support from the National Cancer Institute has found that duloxetine, a medication commonly used to treat chronic pain and psychiatric conditions, does not prevent nerve damage caused by chemotherapy in patients with colorectal cancer.

8 Apr 2026

WSU researchers use spice extracts to enhance medical bone implants

An extract of turmeric and ginger helps bone implants bond strongly while killing bacteria and cancer cells, according to new research from Washington State University with implications for millions of patients with joint replacements and bone cancer.

7 Apr 2026