Jan 7, 2011 - Vaccine for Mesothelioma Is Safe
A group of researchers in Holland have developed a vaccine for mesothelioma that uses dendritic cells taken from the patient’s own bloodstream combined with antigen from the patient’s tumor to induce an immune system response against the cancer. A study testing the vaccine demonstrated that the vaccine was safe and effective for eighty percent of the test group.
Dendritic cells (DC) are a blood cell found in everyone’s blood stream. Dendritic cells function to identify a foreign substance like a cancer cell, and activate the immune system by bringing the foreign substance to the attention of the immune system and such as T cells which attack the foreign substance.
This type of DC based immunotherapy for mesothelioma consists of three vaccinations that are administered either by shot or intravenously over a two week period after chemotherapy. Side effects consist of skin rash and flu like symptoms that did not seem to persist more than a day or two.
Dr. Joachim Aerts, a lung specialist at Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam and one of the authors of the study, noted that one of the problems with treating mesothelioma is that “the immunosuppressive environment caused by the tumor will negatively influence our therapy so we are now working on a method to lower this immunosuppressive environment.”
Dr. Aerts expressed the hope that “by further development of our method it will be possible to increase survival in patients with mesothelioma and eventually vaccinate persons who have been in contact with asbestos to prevent them from getting asbestos-related disease." The results of the study are published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. If you are diagnosed with advanced mesothelioma and would like to read more about the Clinical Trial researching this type of therapy, click here: National Cancer Institute Clinical Trial NCT00280982.
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