Category Archives: Uncategorized

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Cancer Research, Cancer Treatment, Immuno-Oncology, Immunotherapy for Cancer, Uncategorized

Monumental Advances in the Treatment of Bladder Cancer

There is New Hope for Bladder Cancer Treatment
There is New Hope for Bladder Cancer Treatment

When it comes to immunotherapy cancer treatment, checkpoint inhibitors have been a major game-changer. 2017 alone saw five approvals for checkpoint inhibitors that greatly advanced treatment for bladder cancer.

Bladder Cancer Treatment: The Year in Review

During the Society of Urologic Oncology’s annual meeting in late 2017, speaker Elizabeth Plimack, M.D., recapped the year’s highlights in bladder cancer treatments.

– The good news began in February, with the approval of Opdivo for second-line treatment of bladder cancer as a follow-up to platinum-containing therapy.

– After approval in 2016 as a second-line treatment, Tecentriq was granted approval as a front-line treatment in April 2017.

– May 2017 brought about approvals for three more treatments: Imfinzi, Bavencio and Keytruda.

As Plimack stated during her presentation, these approvals demonstrate that checkpoint inhibitors are “here to stay.”

What Lies Ahead?

One area that needs more research is how to be more accurate in choosing patients who will be most receptive to these treatments. Other features that require further studies include duration of response, delayed toxicities and overcoming resistance.

Plimack’s comments included cautioning against extrapolating the data to patients who are eligible for cisplatin, which is a form of chemotherapy. As Plimack explained, more trials are needed before checkpoint inhibitors are approved to replace cisplatin as first-line treatments.

Issels®: Immunotherapy Treatment for Advanced Cancers

We have a successful track record of providing cancer treatment that helps patients achieve long-term remission, even in advanced and therapy-resistant cases. Visit our website to hear and read testimonials from patients of all ages with various forms of cancer who have been treated at Issels®.

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Cancer Treatment, Living with Cancer, Uncategorized

Cancer Treatment: Considerations for the Aged

Consider Treatment when Dealing with the Lives of Senior Citizens.
Consider Treatment when Dealing with the Lives of Senior Citizens.

When you’re diagnosed with cancer at a later age, there are certain factors to take into consideration when you weigh your treatment options. Find out more about how being in your 60s or older can have an effect on cancer treatment.

Underlying Medical Conditions

Having another medical condition, such as diabetes, heart disease or arthritis, might affect the kinds of medication you can take during cancer treatment. It might also have an impact on the type of treatment you can safely undergo. Your oncologist should talk to your regular doctor about any other health conditions you have in order to provide you with safe and effective treatment options.

Nutritional Concerns

If you undergo chemotherapy for cancer, it can end up causing nausea and fatigue, which makes it more difficult to eat nutritious meals and maintain a healthy weight. Since nutrition is an important part of treatment for cancer, you might need to make arrangements to have someone help with meal preparations. You can also look into treatment options with fewer side effects, such as Issels® immunotherapy.

Daily Tasks and Activities

Some forms of treatment, such as radiation, can leave you with low energy levels and other side effects that make it hard to handle daily tasks and activities. Whether you need help around the house or reliable transportation to and from treatment appointments, make plans to have someone assist you with these errands rather than trying to do them on your own.

If you need more information on cancer treatment for the aged, please contact Issels®. We offer nontoxic immunotherapy for many different types and stages of cancer.

Cancer Research, Cancer Treatment, Uncategorized

New Challenges Exposed in Treating Bladder Cancer

Just Because an Answer is Presented with Obstacles That Doesn't Mean it's Impossible.
Just Because an Answer is Presented with Obstacles That Doesn’t Mean it’s Impossible.

Checkpoint inhibitors, one of the major forms of cancer immunotherapy, have played a significant role in the way doctors treat bladder cancer. Researchers are now tackling new challenges in order to improve the effectiveness of these treatments.

Checkpoint Inhibitors and Bladder Cancer

Five checkpoint inhibitors recently received approval from the Food and Drug Administration: Keytruda, Opdivo, Tecentriq, Imfinzi and Bavencio. All five have been tested as both first-line and second-line treatments.

When used with patients who had previously been untreated, these therapies achieved a positive response in 15 to 25 percent. As second-line treatments for patients who had received chemotherapy, only Keytruda showed improvement in overall survival rates.

Solving the Puzzle of Patient Selection

Andrea Necchi, a medical oncologist from Italy, spoke on the topic at last year’s European Multidisciplinary Meeting on Urological Cancers. Necchi explained that patients who respond to checkpoint inhibitors have a high chance of success, so it becomes an issue of patient selection.

According to Necchi, one condition that appears to inhibit use of cancer immunotherapy is the presence of mutations in fibroblast growth factor receptors (FGFR). Testing of pan-FGFR receptors suggests that using them before or after treatment with checkpoint inhibitors could increase chances of a positive response.

Since the use of the five checkpoint inhibitors alone will not boost survival rates, researchers are testing them in different combinations with other treatments, including other checkpoint inhibitors.

Issels®: Leading the Way in Cancer Immunotherapy

Our individually tailored cancer immunotherapy programs are not clinical trials. We have a long track record of helping our patients achieve long-term remission, even with late-stage cancer. Contact us for more information.

Cancer Research, Immuno-Oncology, Immunotherapy, Immunotherapy for Cancer, Uncategorized

Cancer Therapies at the Molecular Level in Intracellular Proteins

Cancer Therapies at the Molecular Level in Intracellular Proteins
Cancer Therapies at the Molecular Level in Intracellular Proteins

As scientists work to refine immunotherapy cancer treatment, they also look for ways to determine which patients are most likely to respond. According to a recent study, one of the answers may lie within a patient’s genetics.

HLA Molecules and Intracellular Proteins

T-cells are a type of white blood cell that’s part of the immune system. Human leukocyte antigen (HLA) molecules help direct T-cells towards cancer cells by binding peptides from intracellular proteins, including those found on tumor cells.

Some immunotherapy treatments that have been successful in fighting metastatic cancers focus on promoting activity of HLA-1 molecules. A research team at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center genotyped more than 1,500 advanced cancer patients to determine if HLA variants had an effect on post-treatment survival.

Do HLA Variants Affect Cancer Treatment?

Since HLA-1 molecules come in a number of different forms with several variants, the researchers speculated that those variations would influence the patients’ responses to treatment. As expected, patients with greater diversity in HLA-1 molecules had a corresponding increase in survival rates.

The study also considered the correlation between somatic mutations within a cancer genome and HLA-1 variations. A higher tumor mutation burden in combination with more diverse HLA-1 molecules was linked to higher survival rates as well.

Gene-Targeted Cancer Treatment at Issels®

Advanced gene-targeted therapies are just one of the treatments available for our comprehensive and individually tailored programs. Non-toxic gene-targeted therapies attack only cancerous cells, making them less harmful to healthy tissues.

Contact us to learn more about cancer vaccines, NK cells and other treatment programs offered at Issels®.

Alternative Cancer Treatment, Cancer Research, Cancer Treatment, Cancer Vaccine, Immuno-Oncology, Immunotherapy, Immunotherapy for Cancer, News, Uncategorized

Adoptive Cell Transfer a Natural Immunotherapy for Cancer

Adoptive Cell Transfer a Natural Immunotherapy for Cancer
Adoptive Cell Transfer a Natural Immunotherapy for Cancer09

Scientists are excited about immunotherapy for cancer because it supplements a patient’s own natural defenses of the immune system. Thanks to a recent study, researchers have made a discovery that could lead to more effective immunotherapy treatments.

What Is Adoptive Cell Transfer?

Adoptive cell transfer, one of the primary forms of immunotherapy for cancer, involves extracting a patient’s T-cells, which are a form of white blood cells that attack foreign invaders in the system. After engineering the T-cells to target the specific proteins in cancer cells, they are injected back into the patient.

While adoptive cell transfer has been successful in treating blood and bone marrow cancers, it’s been less effective with solid tumors. A team from The Scripps Research Institute and the University of California, San Diego set out to find a better way to program the T-cells.

Unleashing the Power of T-Cells

The researchers zeroed in on a protein known as Runx3, which appeared to specifically direct T-cells to solid tumors. During testing on animal models, it was found that overexpression of Runx3 led to delayed tumor growth and longer life.

Matthew Pipkin of Scripps said that Runx3 works on chromosomes within T-cells, enabling them to focus on killing tumor cells. Pipkin was hopeful that their discovery would pave the way for improving the effectiveness of adoptive cell transfer on solid tumors.

Issels®: The Leader in Immunotherapy for Cancer

Our proprietary immunobiologic core protocols are specifically designed to meet each patient’s individual needs. Contact us to learn more about our record of helping patients achieve and sustain long-term remission.

Cancer Research, Cancer Treatment, Immuno-Oncology, Immunotherapy, News, Uncategorized

Why Some Lung Cancers Do Not Respond to Some Types of Immunotherapy Treatment

Why Some Lung Cancers Do Not Respond to Some Types of Immunotherapy Treatment
Why Some Lung Cancers Do Not Respond to Some Types of Immunotherapy Treatment

Despite the drop in smoking rates, lung cancer remains the second most common form of the disease in the United States. Scientists are hopeful that a recent discovery will aid the development of more effective immunotherapy for lung cancer.

A Roadblock in Lung Cancer Treatment

The immune system is the body’s first line of defense against foreign invaders. Immunotherapy is a form of cancer treatment that boosts the ability of the immune system to seek out and destroy cancer cells.

Current immunotherapy for lung cancer includes a drug that shuts down a protein on the surface of tumor cells. The protein, called PD-L1, latches on to T cells and prevents them from attacking.

Unfortunately, many lung cancer patients didn’t respond positively to this treatment. Scientists realized they needed to learn more about the “immune compartment of lung tumors,” which involves the relationship between the cancer cells and the tumor microenvironment.

Scientists Make a Breakthrough

A research team in Switzerland studied mice with a form of lung cancer similar to that in humans. They found that a type of immune cell known as Gr1+ neutrophils actually triggers a cycle in the microenvironment that promotes the growth of tumor cells.

Team leader Prof. Etienne Meylan explained that neutrophils are an essential part of the immune response, so removing them is not the answer. Future research will focus on how the neutrophils operate and how immunotherapy for lung cancer can work around them.

Issels®: The Leader in Effective Immunotherapy

For decades, we have been successful treating patients with immunotherapy for lung cancer and other forms of the disease. Contact us for more information.