Researchers in San Antonio plan to combat liver cancer in South Texas through new drug developments with the help of nearly $1 million in congressional earmarked funds granted Monday to accelerate clinical trials.
In South Texas, Hispanic populations are twice more likely to get liver cancer compared to the rest of the country, due to the twin epidemic of obesity and type 2 diabetes.
Metabolic dysfunctions associated with steatohepatitis lead to the highest incidence of liver cancer in the nation in Hispanics, as well in the region from San Antonio to the border, UT Health Science Center at San Antonio’s Acting President Robert Hromas said at UT Health’s former building of administration, now the UT Health School of Public Health.
The new school will welcome 35 students for its inaugural class this fall, who will be encouraged to work in the public health sector in San Antonio.
Dr. Vasan S. Ramachandran, the public health school’s inaugural dean, led a tour of the newly renovated building on Floyd Curl Drive, where students and faculty were already walking over for lunch from the locally-owned family business, Rocio’s Café.
Liver cancer is the most common type of cancer in San Antonio and South Texas. Populations with a high prevalence of obesity and type 2 diabetes are at higher risk of fatty liver disease, the biggest driver of liver cancer.
One in six San Antonians already have type 2 diabetes. In recent years, researchers found “the youngest case” in San Antonio, a 5-year-old with type 2 diabetes. In Bexar County, 66% of adults are obese, with rates disproportionately high among Hispanic and Black populations, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
U.S. Congressman Joaquin Castro, whose district covers San Antonio’s Northwest Side where UT Health San Antonio is located, announced Monday that he had secured $963,000 in community project funding for medicinal chemistry infrastructure for hepatic steatosis therapeutic development, which will fund the creation of chemical synthetic techniques to discover treatments for hepatic steatosis in San Antonio — also known as fatty liver disease.
Castro joined the tour, seeing firsthand how an additional $1 million in congressional funding he secured in 2023 transformed UT Health San Antonio and UTSA’s shared school, adding four floors of classrooms, a cafeteria and study areas for masters of public health students.
Castro, who was open about his own surgery to remove cancerous tumors last year, attended the event after a drug therapy treatment at UT Health San Antonio on Monday morning.
“There are a lot of things that we’re proud of as San Antonians about our city. One of the challenges that we face is that we see a lot of chronic diseases here,” Castro said. “Diabetes, hypertension, obesity, different forms of cancer.”
“Combatting those things in researching them and ultimately helping develop treatments for them are incredibly important,” he said.
Hromas said drug development for fatty liver disease will be used in testing senolytic therapy of fatty liver disease in clinical trials, meaning San Antonio researchers’ drugs will hopefully kill the senescent cells in a fatty liver that cause cells around it to become dysfunctional.
“In this manner, we prevent the progression to diabetes, we prevent the progression of death to cirrhosis, we prevent the progression to liver cancer, and hopefully make a dent in the epidemic of liver cancer in South Texas,” Hromas said.
Last year, Castro also secured $1 million in Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) funds for drug development in fatty liver disease.
Since that funding, researchers have developed “several hundred” lead candidates for the clinical study and are picking the best one to put to trial in humans through senolytic therapy.
The school will partner with community organizations to begin to understand why the people of South Texas have higher rates of obesity and fatty liver disease.
“Although this is the school, most of our learning will be outside. The county is our classroom, the community is our curriculum. The people, we have to meet them where they are and listen to them and their lived experience,” Ramachandran said.
At the Mays Cancer Center down the street, several clinical trials are also focused on liver cancer. Some focus on earlier testing, prevention and improving the quality of life for those already living with cancer, or who have survived liver cancer.
