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IMDZ > Using a virus to teach the immune system to kill cancer

Abstract

http://www.fredhutch.org/en/news/center-news/2017/06/sarcoma-vaccine-virus-immunotherapy.html

“The results, so far, are exciting and show that the vaccine works, generates an immune response and stabilizes tumors, and [it] will definitely lead to additional studies,” said study leader Dr. Neeta Somaiah of MD Anderson Cancer Center, who presented the main trial results at the meeting, which is being held through Tuesday in Chicago. “Hopefully, if we design the studies right, we will have this as a treatment option in the near future.”

At the meeting, Somaiah reported that in 16 of 25 participants with advanced soft-tissue sarcoma, tumors were stable after the patients received injections of the experimental vaccine, dubbed CMB305. Of these, about three-quarters had no disease progression by three months and 83 percent of them were still alive after one year.

These results “compare favorably” to published data on several FDA-approved therapies for these cancers, said Dr. Seth Pollack, one of the senior investigators on the trial and a physician-scientist at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center who specializes in sarcoma. For example, according to published trials, the tumors of about half of soft-tissue sarcoma patients who receive the chemotherapy trabectedin progress four months after therapy; for the chemotherapy eribulin, half have progressed less than three months out.

The findings from the CMB305 trial are especially noteworthy in light of how easy the drug was on most patients in the trial compared to chemotherapy, a typical treatment for sarcomas. Only one trial participant had a serious side effect (severe pain at the tumor site); the rest reported relatively minor side effects such as soreness at the injection site that lasted one day.

For most patients with these sarcomas, Pollack said, the most difficult symptoms they face throughout their illness are side effects from chemotherapy or other standard treatments — so getting off chemo is a big boost to their well-being, even though they still have cancer.