We answer your questions.

Unfortunately, no. A great deal of research is still needed to find the right dose of medication to give, and to confirm its efficiency and safety for humans. We are working hard to make sure it becomes available as soon as possible!

It seems to work on several types of cancer cells and on in vivo animal models. We had to make the difficult choice of focusing our resources on specific types of cancer to treat, as research is very expensive. We decided to target cancers that are known to be more difficult to treat. It seemed the best possible choice to make.

Human testing has not started yet. When it does, patient recruitment for clinical trials will be publicly announced.

When administered orally to mice with cancer, RM-581 was found to be active, with little to no toxicity. As such, we expect it will be possible for the treatment to be taken safely at home. This, however, remains to be confirmed through clinical trials.

RM-581 belongs to a new class of molecules called “aminosteroid derivatives”. It is the first product of its kind to be studied as a treatment for cancer.

RM-581 works through a complex mechanism that is yet to be fully understood. However, we do have some clues about it. Cancer cells are highly “stressed” cells, much more so than normal cells. RM-581 exposes cells to yet another stress factor. As the cancer cell is already weakened, the addition of this extra stress becomes too much for it to bear and leads to its death (the scientific term for this is “apoptosis”). Meanwhile, healthy or “normal” cells tend to become slightly more stressed with RM-581, but not enough to die. They thus survive. As a result, there are expected to be fewer side effects than with conventional cancer drugs.