Resveratrol and cancer: Challenges for clinical translation

• The main issues blocking resveratrol as a cancer treatment are discussed.
• A survey of public & private research done on resveratrol forms is performed.
• We suggest that the appropriate dose of resveratrol is disease-specific.
• Work done to determine resveratrol's anticancer mechanism is explored.
• Completed trials are investigated to offer suggestions to plan better research.

Significant work has been done towards identifying the health-beneficial effects of the grape antioxidant resveratrol in a variety of bioassay- and disease- models, with much research being focused on its possible application to cancer management. Despite the large number of preclinical studies dealing with different aspects of the biological effects of resveratrol, its translation to clinics is far from reality due to a variety of challenges. In this review, we discuss the issues and questions associated with resveratrol becoming an effective in vivo anticancer drug, from basic metabolic issues to the problems faced by incomplete understanding of the mechanism(s) of action in the body. We also explore efforts taken by researchers, both public and private, to contend with some of these issues. By examining the published data and previous clinical trials, we have attempted to identify the problems and issues that hinder the clinical translation of resveratrol for cancer management. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Resveratrol: Challenges in translating pre-clinical findings to improved patient outcomes.