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Potential Role of Selenium in the Treatment of Cancer and Viral Infections
Journal article   Open access   Peer reviewed

Potential Role of Selenium in the Treatment of Cancer and Viral Infections

Aseel O Rataan, Sean M Geary, Yousef Zakharia, Youcef M Rustum and Aliasger K Salem
International journal of molecular sciences, Vol.23(4), p.2215
02/17/2022
DOI: 10.3390/ijms23042215
PMCID: PMC8879146
PMID: 35216330
url
https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms23042215View
Published (Version of record) Open Access

Abstract

Selenium has been extensively evaluated clinically as a chemopreventive agent with variable results depending on the type and dose of selenium used. Selenium species are now being therapeutically evaluated as modulators of drug responses rather than as directly cytotoxic agents. In addition, recent data suggest an association between selenium base-line levels in blood and survival of patients with COVID-19. The major focus of this mini review was to summarize: the pathways of selenium metabolism; the results of selenium-based chemopreventive clinical trials; the potential for using selenium metabolites as therapeutic modulators of drug responses in cancer (clear-cell renal-cell carcinoma (ccRCC) in particular); and selenium usage alone or in combination with vaccines in the treatment of patients with COVID-19. Critical therapeutic targets and the potential role of different selenium species, doses, and schedules are discussed.
Drug Resistance Chemotherapy cancer viral infection selenium

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