Molecular mechanisms and therapeutic applications of huaier in breast cancer treatment

Abstract

Breast cancer is one of the most common female malignant tumors today and represents a serious health risk for women. Although the survival rate and quality of life of patients with breast cancer are improving with the continuous development of medical technology, metastasis, recurrence, and drug resistance of breast cancer remain a significant problem. Huaier, a traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) fungus, is a type of Sophora embolism fungus growing on old Sophora stems. The polysaccharides of Trametes robiniophila Murr (PS-T) are the main active ingredient of Huaier. There is increasing evidence that Huaier has great potential in breast cancer treatment, and its anti-cancer mechanism may be related to a variety of biological activities, such as the inhibition of cell proliferation, metastasis, tumor angiogenesis, the promotion of cancer cell death, and regulation of tumor-specific immunity. There is growing evidence that Huaier may be effective in the clinical treatment of breast cancer. This review systematically summarizes the basic and clinical studies on the use of Huaier in the treatment of breast cancer, providing useful information to guide the clinical application of Huaier and future clinical studies.

Long-term oral administration of Huaier granules improves survival outcomes in hepatocellular carcinoma patients within Milan criteria following microwave ablation: a propensity score matching and stabilized inverse probability weighting analysis

“…Numerous laboratory experiments have unveiled the potential mechanism behind Huaier’s anti-tumor therapy ( Zhu et al, 2022 ; Luo et al, 2023 ; Jin et al, 2024 ; Li et al, 2024 ). This includes the downregulation of cyclin-dependent kinase, Cyclin D, β-catenin, and other cell cycle regulatory proteins, inducing G1/S phase arrest in HCC cells ( Zhang et al, 2015 ; Bao et al, 2016 ; Hu et al, 2016 ; Niu et al, 2020 ; Xu et al, 2020 ).…”