COLUMBUS, Ohio—Blueberry extracts may inhibit the growth of blood vessel tumors in infants and children, according to a new study published in Antioxidants & Redox Signaling.
Researchers at Ohio State University found that feeding a blueberry extract to mice with blood vessel tumors called hemangionendotheliomas safely decreased the size of the tumors and improved survival. The tumors affect 3 percent of children and usually occur within four weeks of birth and often affect premature infants. They can be disfiguring and, in some cases, threaten the health of a child.
Mice with blood vessel tumors that were fed the blueberry extract lived twice as long as mice that did not get the substance and had tumors 60-percent smaller than mice that did not receive blueberry extract treatment, the study said.
"This work provides the first evidence demonstrating that blueberry extract can limit tumor formation by inhibiting the formation of blood vessels and inhibiting certain signaling pathways," said Gayle Gordillo, MD, principal investigator of the Ohio State team. "Oral administration of blueberry extract represents a potential therapeutic strategy for treating endothelial cell tumors in children."
The study also showed that the blueberry extract inhibited two important biochemical signaling pathways needed by tumor cells to grow.
“This finding could have implications in other cancers, including breast, some melanomas, head and neck and ovarian,” Gordillo said.
