Electrochemotherapy with bleomycin - a resume of published clinical trials

Introduction Electroporation is characteristed by the use of short, high voltage pulses which transiently permeabilize the cell membrane. As electroporation can be used to introduce various molecules directly into the cell cytosol, an obvious use has been to introduce chemotherapeutic drugs directly into cancer cells (electrochemotherapy). Many chemotherapeutic drugs are lipophilic and enter cells permeabilized or not. However, for some drugs, the cytotoxicity can be greatly enhanced by electroporation. Examples are bleomycin, cisand carboplatinum. It is for these drugs, that the enhancement of their cytotoxicity has been documented both in vitro, in preclinical and in clinical experiments. The present resume focuses on the use of bleomycin in electrochemotherapy of malignant tumors.