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Review
. 2021 Dec 23:11:792290.
doi: 10.3389/fonc.2021.792290. eCollection 2021.

Opioid Receptor-Mediated and Non-Opioid Receptor-Mediated Roles of Opioids in Tumour Growth and Metastasis

Claudia A Scroope  1 , Zane Singleton  1 , Markus W Hollmann  2 , Marie-Odile Parat  1
Affiliations
Review

Opioid Receptor-Mediated and Non-Opioid Receptor-Mediated Roles of Opioids in Tumour Growth and Metastasis

Claudia A Scroope et al. Front Oncol. .

Abstract

Opioids are administered to cancer patients in the period surrounding tumour excision, and in the management of cancer-associated pain. The effects of opioids on tumour growth and metastasis, and their consequences on disease outcome, continue to be the object of polarised, discrepant literature. It is becoming clear that opioids contribute a range of direct and indirect effects to the biology of solid tumours, to the anticancer immune response, inflammation, angiogenesis and importantly, to the tumour-promoting effects of pain. A common misconception in the literature is that the effect of opioid agonists equates the effect of the mu-opioid receptor, the major target of the analgesic effect of this class of drugs. We review the evidence on opioid receptor expression in cancer, opioid receptor polymorphisms and cancer outcome, the effect of opioid antagonists, especially the peripheral antagonist methylnaltrexone, and lastly, the evidence available of a role for opioids through non-opioid receptor mediated actions.

Keywords: OGFr; TLR4; cancer; metastasis; opioid antagonist; opioid receptor.

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Conflict of interest statement

MH has received research funding from CSL Behring, ZonMw, the Society of Cardiovasular Anesthesiologists (SCA) and the European Association of Cardiothoracic Anaesthesiology (EACTA); and has received compensation from Eurocept Pharmaceuticals BV and IDD for service as a consultant. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

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