Electrochemotherapy: advantages and drawbacks in treatment of cancer patients

Electrochemotherapy combines administration of nonpermeant or poorly permeant chemotherapeutic drugs with application of electric pulses to the tumors in order to facilitate the drug delivery into the cells. Thus, enhanced drug delivery can substantially potentiate chemotherapeutic drug effectiveness, locally at the site of the cell electroporation by electric pulses, without affecting drug effectiveness in the tissues that were not exposed to electric pulses. Vast amount of information gathered on effectiveness and mechanisms of action of electrochemotherapy facilitated clinical trials using bleomycin and cisplatin in electrochemotherapy protocols. All studies provided evidence that electrochemotherapy is effective treatment for local tumor growth in patients with different cancer types. In this review we gathered the data of the clinical trials that have been published so far, and presented our latest clinical experience on electrochemotherapy with cisplatin at the Institute of Oncology in Ljubljana, pointing out the advantages and drawbacks of this treatment.