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Melatonin helps some people sleep and is safe at usual doses, but the claim that high-dose melatonin improves survival rests on a series of small unblinded trials from one group that has never been reproduced elsewhere. It is not a cancer treatment.
Melatonin, the pineal hormone that signals night, has antioxidant, immunomodulatory and antiproliferative effects in laboratory models. A 2012 meta-analysis of randomised trials of 20 mg melatonin alongside chemotherapy reported improved one-year survival and reduced toxicity, but almost all included trials came from a single Italian group, were unblinded and small, and independent trials have not replicated the survival effect. Better-conducted trials of melatonin for sleep, delirium and fatigue in cancer patients are mixed, with some benefit for sleep quality and little for fatigue. Low-dose melatonin is a reasonable short-term sleep aid in survivors when behavioural therapy is unavailable. High-dose melatonin as an anticancer adjunct is unproven; it may interact with sedatives and anticoagulants.
Melatonin acts on MT1 and MT2 receptors and as a free-radical scavenger, with circadian and putative oncostatic effects observed mainly in vitro and in rodents.
Query for this technology: (TITLE:"Melatonin as a cancer adjunct" OR ABSTRACT:"Melatonin as a cancer adjunct") AND (cancer OR tumor OR tumour OR oncology OR carcinoma OR lymphoma OR leukemia OR leukaemia OR myeloma OR sarcoma OR melanoma OR glioma). Results are unfiltered search hits about Melatonin as a cancer adjunct, not a curated reading list.
Shares Dietary supplements during cancer treatment: interactions and harms, Evidence-based integrative oncology, Preclinical results do not reproduce, Misinformation and unproven therapies and the tags complementary, supportive-care.
Shares Dietary supplements during cancer treatment: interactions and harms, Evidence-based integrative oncology, Misinformation and unproven therapies and the tags complementary, supportive-care.
Shares Dietary supplements during cancer treatment: interactions and harms, Evidence-based integrative oncology, Misinformation and unproven therapies and the tags complementary, supportive-care.
Shares Dietary supplements during cancer treatment: interactions and harms, Evidence-based integrative oncology, Misinformation and unproven therapies and the tags complementary, supportive-care.
Shares Dietary supplements during cancer treatment: interactions and harms, Evidence-based integrative oncology, Misinformation and unproven therapies and the tags complementary, supportive-care.
Shares Evidence-based integrative oncology, Misinformation and unproven therapies and the tags complementary, supportive-care.
Shares Evidence-based integrative oncology, Misinformation and unproven therapies and the tags complementary, supportive-care.
Shares Dietary supplements during cancer treatment: interactions and harms, Evidence-based integrative oncology and the tags complementary, supportive-care.