Potential role of transforming growth factor-beta 1/Smad signaling in secondary lymphedema after cancer surgery.

ABSTRACT: Secondary lymphedema often develops after cancer surgery, and over 250 million patients suffer from this complication. A major symptom of secondary lymphedema is swelling with fibrosis, which lowers the patient's quality of life, even if cancer does not recur. Nonetheless, the pathophysiology of secondary lymphedema remains unclear, with therapeutic approaches limited to physical or surgical therapy. There is no effective pharmacological therapy for secondary lymphedema. Notably, the lack of animal models that accurately mimic human secondary lymphedema has hindered pathophysiological investigations of the disease. Here, we developed a novel rat hindlimb model of secondary lymphedema and showed that our rat model mimics human secondary lymphedema from early to late stages in terms of cell

SUBMITTER: Sano M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7385355 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature