Hollings Researchers find Boswellia, an extract of frankincense, shows anti-cancer activity in patients with breast cancer

Extracts of a plant used in traditional medicine for centuries have shown anti-proliferative effects against breast cancer in a small early-stage clinical trial. Researchers at MUSC Hollings Cancer Center provided breast cancer patients with an extract of the Boswellia tree – probably best known as the source of frankincense – and instructed them to take it each day until surgery. The researchers then compared the activity of cancer cells in each woman’s tumor removed during surgery with the activity in the piece of her tumor that was removed during the biopsy. “We looked at differences in the growth rate of the tumors before and after treatment, and we found that the tumors after treatment had a lower growth rate compared to before treatment,” said Nancy Klauber-DeMore, M.D., a surgical oncologist and co-leader of the Developmental Cancer Therapeutics research program at Hollings Cancer Center. The team also looked at biopsy and tumor samples of women who didn’t take the Boswellia extract. “We saw a statistically significant reduction in tumor proliferation compared to the non-treated group, so the implications are that Boswellia, this extract of frankincense, does have anti-cancer activity in humans,” Klauber-DeMore said.