Patients with metastatic solid tumors often have very limited treatment options due to cumulative toxicity of cytoreductive chemotherapy and drug resistance. A new approach to the maintenance or reduction in size of metastatic tumors is inhibition of new blood vessel growth into the tumor bed or angiogenesis. Copper has been shown to be a requirement for angiogenesis in animals. We seek to determine whether a decrease in copper causes shrinkage or slows growth of solid tumors. The most potent inhibitor of copper known is Tetrathiomolybdate (TM), developed at the UM for the treatment of patients with Wilson's disease who suffer from extremely high levels of copper in tissues. Whereas TM has been safely administered to humans with Wilson's disease, its toxicity profile in patients with metastatic cancer is not known. We propose a Phase I study of TM in patients with metastatic solid tumors who have exhausted other treatment options.
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