Hope for pancreatic cancer vaccine
Early trial results for a pancreatic cancer vaccine used as treatment have raised hope for the development of this therapy.
At last month’s European Cancer Conference in Copenhagen, Dr Robert
Maki, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York, reported a phase
I study of the vaccine in 10 patients with pancreatic cancer.
Surgeons first operated to remove the primary tumour completely. The
vaccine was then administered within eight weeks of surgery. No patients
had chemotherapy or radiotherapy. The overall survival for the 10 patients
was, on average, two-and-a-half years. The typical survival after surgery
for pancreatic cancer is 14–15 months. One patient out of the 10
in the trial was still alive and without disease after five years. Two
more were alive and disease-free after more than two years.
Dr Maki reported that the trial screened out people who had evidence
of tumour spread, “so we may be biased in who we selected”.
However, statistics show that mortality is still about 90 per cent within
two years, even for those who have complete removal of their cancer.
The vaccine was created from a heat-shock protein taken from the patients’ own
tumours. It was too early to tell whether it would be possible to create
a vaccine that could be used on all patients, Dr Maki said. A method
for purifying the vaccine overcame the problem of pancreatic enzymes
attacking the vaccine after administration.
However, Dr Maki warned that a larger study was needed to “get
a better picture of the efficacy of this vaccine”. |
