Hydrogen Inhalation Helps Gallbladder Cancer Patient Achieve Remission
- Authors
- Ji-Bing Chen, Feng Mu, Tianyu Lu, Yangyang Ma, Duanming Du, Ke-Cheng Xu
- Journal
- OncoTargets and Therapy
- Year
- 2019
- DOI
- 10.2147/OTT.S227217
- Study Type
- Human
- Outcome
- Positive
- Peer Reviewed
- Yes
- Country
- China
- Health Condition
- Gallbladder Carcinoma
- Body System
- Digestive System
TL;DR
Inhaling hydrogen gas helped a patient with advanced gallbladder cancer by initially making the tumors look worse before they actually started to shrink, leading to an improvement in the patient's health and prolonged survival.
Key Finding
A patient with metastatic gallbladder cancer experienced initial tumor growth followed by sustained remission after hydrogen inhalation therapy, a pattern similar to pseudo-progression seen with PD-1 immunotherapy drugs.
Summary
A 72-year-old woman with advanced gallbladder cancer that had spread to other organs received hydrogen gas therapy along with standard supportive care. Initially, her tumors appeared to grow larger and tumor markers (blood tests indicating cancer activity) increased, but then the tumors began shrinking over the following weeks. Her symptoms improved, blood counts normalized, and she was able to return to normal activities for over 10 months. This pattern—where tumors temporarily appear worse before improving—resembles what sometimes happens with certain cancer immunotherapy drugs.
Practical Takeaway
This is a single case report, not a controlled study, so it cannot establish whether hydrogen therapy caused the improvement or whether this would occur in other patients. The authors suggest hydrogen may affect immune cell function in ways similar to established cancer drugs, but this remains speculative. Much more rigorous research would be needed before drawing any conclusions about hydrogen's role in cancer treatment.
Abstract
Background: Hydrogen therapy has been reported to convert exhausted programmed cell death receptor (PD-1)+CD8+ T cells to PD-1-CD8+ T cells, in advanced colorectal cancer patients, which is associated with significantly prolonged survival. Case presentation: A 72-year-old female patient presented with metastatic gallbladder cancer and underwent symptomatic treatment combined with hydrogen therapy. The tumors were initially enlarged and displayed increased tumor marker expression following hydrogen inhalation therapy, after which they continued to remit, similar to the pseudo-progression that occurs after anti-PD-1 treatment. During one month of hydrogen therapy, the patient's gallbladder and liver tumors continued to progress, and intestinal obstruction occurred. The intestinal obstruction was gradually relieved after symptomatic treatment, and the metastases in the abdominal cavity gradually decreased in size, anemia and hypoalbuminemia were corrected, and both the lymphocyte and tumor marker levels returned to normal. The patient was able to resume normal life two and a half months after hydrogen inhalation and survived over 10 months. Conclusion: This is the first report of pseudo-progression followed by sustained remission after hydrogen inhalation. This phenomenon is similar to the pseudo-progression-remission pattern that occurs following PD-1 antibody treatment. These findings suggest that hydrogen may have an inhibitory effect on PD-1 expression.