Flor-Essence herbal tonic does not inhibit mammary tumor development in Sprague Dawley rats.
BACKGROUND
Women who are diagnosed with breast cancer often self-administer complementary and alternative medicines to augment their conventional treatments, improve health, or prevent recurrence. Flor-Essence tonic is a complex mixture of herbal extracts used by cancer patients because of anecdotal evidence that it can treat or prevent disease.


METHODS
Female Sprague-Dawley rats were given water or exposed to 3 or 6% Flor-Essence beginning at 1 day of age. Mammary tumors were induced with a single oral 40 mg/kg/bw dose of dimethyl-benz[a]anthracene at 50 days of age and sacrificed at 23 weeks. Rats were maintained on AIN-76A diet.


RESULTS
Control rats had palpable mammary tumor incidence of 51.0% at 19 weeks of age compared to 65.0 and 59.4% for the 3 and 6% Flor-Essence groups respectively. Overall, no significant difference in time until first palpable tumor was detected among any of the groups. At necropsy, mammary tumor incidence was 82.5% for controls compared to 90.0 and 97.3% for rats consuming 3 and 6% Flor-Essence, respectively. Mean mammary tumor multiplicity (+/-SES) for the controls was 2.8 (+/-0.5) and statistically different from the 3 or 6% Flor-Essence groups with 5.2 (+/-0.7), and 4.8 (+/-0.6), respectively (p < or = 0.01). As expected, the majority of isolated tumors were diagnosed as adenocarcinomas.


CONCLUSIONS
Flor-Essence can promote mammary tumor development in the Sprague-Dawley rat model. This observation is contrary to widely available anecdotal evidence as well as the desire of the consumer that this commercially available herbal tonic will suppress and/or inhibit tumor growth.
Bennett
L Michelle
LM
Center for Cancer Research, NCI, NIH, Bethesda, MD 20852, USA. lmbennett@nih.gov
Montgomery
Jennifer L
JL
Steinberg
Seth M
SM
Kulp
Kristen S
KS
D000284:Administration, Oral; D000818:Animals; D001551:Benz(a)Anthracenes / Q000008:administration & dosage; D001628:Beverages; D005260:Female; D015674:Mammary Neoplasms, Animal / Q000209:etiology* / Q000517:prevention & control*; D008325:Mammary Neoplasms, Experimental / Q000209:etiology* / Q000517:prevention & control*; D010936:Plant Extracts / Q000009:adverse effects* / Q000494:pharmacology*; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley
D001551:Benz(a)Anthracenes; D010936:Plant Extracts; C488083:flor-essence