Inhibitory Effect of Wogonin Combined with Gemcitabine on Implanted Human Pancreatic Cancer in Nude Mice and the Mechanism

The aim of this study is to investigate the inhibitory effect of wogonin combined with gemcitabine on implanted human pancreatic cancer in nude mice and the mechanism. The implanted nude mouse model of SW1990 cells was established. Forty modeled nude mice randomly divided into control, wogonin, gemcitabine, and wogonin+gemcitabine groups, 10 nude mice in each group, which received the treatment using normal saline, wogonin (mg/kg.day), gemcitabine (150 mg/kg.week), wogonin (mg/kg.day) combined with gemcitabine (150 mg/kg.week) for three weeks, respectively. After treatment, compared with gemcitabine group, in wogonin+gemcitabine group the tumor volume and tumor weight were significantly decreased (P < 0.05), the tumor inhibition rate was significantly increased (P < 0.05), the serum tumor necrosis factor-alpha, interleukin 6 and interleukin 1 beta levels were significantly decreased (P < 0.05), the apoptosis rate of tumor cells was significantly increased (P < 0.05), the tumor tissue B-cell lymphoma-2 protein expression level was significantly decreased (P < 0.05), and the tumor tissue Bcl-2 associated X and p53 protein expression levels were significantly increased (P < 0.05). In conclusion, compared with single use of gemcitabine, the combined use of wogonin and gemcitabine can enhance the inhibitory effect on implanted SW1990 human pancreatic cancer in nude mice. The mechanism may be related to the synergistic effect in reducing the release of inflammatory factors and promoting the apoptosis of tumor cells.