Antiangiogenic cancer treatment: The great discovery and greater complexity (Review)

The discovery of tumor angiogenesis opened a new path in fighting cancer. The approval of different antiangiogenic agents, most targeting vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) signaling, has either increased the effectiveness of standard chemotherapy or even replaced it by offering better patient outcomes. However, an increasing number of preclinical and clinical observations have shown that the process of angiogenesis is far from clearly understood. Apart from targeting the VEGF pathway, novel strategies aim to influence other molecular factors that are involved in tumor angiogenesis. In addition, naturally occurring compounds seem to offer additional agents for influencing angiogenesis. The first concept of antiangiogenic therapy aimed to destroy tumor vessels, while it turned out that, paradoxically, antiangiogenic drugs normalized vasculature and as a result offered an improvement in chemotherapeutic delivery. In order to design an effective treatment schedule, methods for detecting the time window of normalization and biomarkers predicting patient response are needed. The initial idea that antiangiogenic therapy would be resistance-free failed to materialize and currently we still face the obstacle of resistance to antiangiogenic therapy.