Speaking of deep science that is going on, this past weekend, researchers from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center presented unpublished results at the annual AAAS meeting. They tested generic CAR-T cells to patients who had late-stage leukemia and lymphoma that had exhausted other treatment options.
Researchers were shocked to find that 27 of the 29 leukemia patients went into complete remission and showed no more signs of the disease.
In the study, T cells were removed from patient’s blood and tweaked their genes to recognize the cancer cells that would otherwise slip by the immune system. The CAR-T cells were inserted back using a vector. In many previous studies the T cells ended up being less effective over time, either because the cells themselves become exhausted or because the cancer cells inhibit detection. Dr. Stanley Riddell, one of the researchers behind the trial, figured a way to increase the results.Many of the patients who were not expected to live for more than a few months are still alive now, three years after the trial started.
The results of this trial were different. In addition to the results from the leukemia patients, 19 of 30 lymphoma patients responded to the treatment as well, after just a single dose of CAR-T cells. “This is unprecedented in medicine, to be honest, to get response rates in this range in these very advanced patients,” Dr. Riddell said. But the treatment isn’t perfect quite yet. During the trial, seven patients developed cytokine release syndrome, a life-threatening inflammation that results when too many cancer cells are killed at once, and two of the patients died as a result.
While that might be acceptable risk for a last-ditch effort for patients with terminal cancer, such dramatic side effects wouldn’t be acceptable for patients with earlier stage or less lethal cancers.
The researchers don’t yet know the best dose for the treatment that wouldn’t cause such a strong reaction but would still get rid of the cancer, and they don’t know how long the patients will remain in remission.
The researchers have submitted a draft of their study to a journal and hope that it will be published soon so they can continue their work. The study is being sponsored by Juno and the trial has a termination date of 2023.
I can see how ImmunoPulse might come into play here, due to its reduction of toxicity and capabilities to synergize. I see it as a first line therapy that can assist every other therapy in helping those that do not respond.
AI
