When was chemotherapy first introduced as a cancer treatment?
History of cancer chemotherapy
The era of cancer chemotherapy began in the 1940s with the first use of nitrogen mustards and folic acid antagonist drugs. The targeted therapy revolution had arrived, but many of the principles and limitations of chemotherapy discovered by the early researchers still apply.
VAMP regimen
VAMP regimen or VAMP chemotherapy is a four-drug combination chemotherapy regimen, used today in the treatment of Hodgkin lymphoma. It was one of the earliest combination chemotherapy regimens, originally developed as a treatment for childhood leukemia by a group of researchers at the National Cancer Institute led by Emil Frei and Emil Freireich. The first clinical trial of VAMP began in 1961. Because it was the first time that four chemotherapeutic agents were used at once, the trial was highly controversial at its time. Although new combination chemotherapy regimens have replaced the use of VAMP in the treatment of childhood leukemia, VAMP is considered an important precursor to modern treatments, confirming the effectiveness of combination chemotherapy and leading to the use of combination chemotherapy regimens to treat other types of cancer.