One interesting thing to note about the Optune/stats patients alive at the end of the study (aka: 24 months after last patient enrolled) is that Optune made up no ground (13% alive versus 11% alive) on "gross total" resections. This follows the Celldex/Rintega picture as well. The benefit was really found in the partial and biopsy (for Optune) and partial (for Rintega patients.) I call this the "surgeon's helper" phenomenon. In other words, I believe both Optune and Rintega help surgeons on the front end with parts of the tumor they can't reach with their scalpel, thus giving advantages over the standard of care up front, but once more patients essentially get the benefit of a "gross total resection," via surgery + therapy, the benefits of the two therapies quickly wear thin.
Contrast that to NWBO's DCvax-L. What I expect to see is that NWBO can also play "surgeon's helper" as defined above, but then extend that benefit in many "total resection" patients (and some partial resection) patients by continuing to prevent tumor escape, which the two other treatments above are not typically capable of accomplishing.
The reason I say this is that with Rintega and Optune, there just seems to be no therapeutic advantage in adding their therapies to total resections. I think we will find there is a long term survival advantage with DCVax-L in adding therapy to total resection (as well as partial resections).
* Note: In GBM, there is really no such thing as a complete surgical resection. Tendrils, clumps and individual tumor cells hide from the surgeon's knife/laser and always persist after surgical intervention alone.
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