Exploring Iridium Complexes as Promising Alternatives for Breast Cancer Treatment

Abstract

Breast cancer is one of the most common cancers in women and it poses a significant health threat to the entire world. Cisplatin, a widely known metal-based chemotherapeutic agent, is effective towards various malignant cells but its extensive side effects and drug resistance limits its application. This has led to platinum-based therapies being replaced by other transition metal-based anti-cancer drugs. This systematic review evaluates the current evidence supporting the efficacy and selectivity of iridium complexes in the treatment of breast cancer in comparison to traditional therapy. Searching through the Web of Science database completely led to 426 records. PICO format was screened and applied by focusing on specific criteria including inclusion and exclusion criteria thereby identifying ten articles for final review. The results demonstrated that different iridium compounds have lower IC50, and higher SI compared to cisplatin, indicating more effectiveness and selectivity particularly against MDA-MB-468 and MDA-MB-231 cell lines. However, it should be noted that there is a significant gap in the studies of structure- activity relationship (SAR) on these iridium compounds. Optimisation of their efficacy and safety profiles has been hindered by lack of detailed SAR data which poses a huge challenge for clinical trial development. However, before iridium-based drugs can be assessed for use in clinical trials, complete SAR data must be obtained.