hey look, a cure for cancer (n. locker-room, so Kobe is safe)
- From: "the Bede" <rspwsownthebede@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 14:11:40 -0500
http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/news/display.var.2350849.0.Doctors_cure_patient_of_skin_cancer_thanks_to_cloning.php
Doctor Cures Patient of Skin Cancer Thanks to Cloning
Martin Williams
The cloning of immune cells has allowed doctors to successfully rid a
patient of advanced skin cancer.
Details of the breakthrough show that in just two months, scans revealed
that the 52-year-old man's tumours, which had spread to his lungs, were
gone.
It is the first solid evidence that the experimental T-cell treatment works.
But the US scientists are quick to point out that the results involved one
patient.
Further trials will be needed to prove that the results were no fluke, they
stressed.
It will still provide hope to those caught up in what has been an alarming
rise in skin cancer cases in Scotland. The disease claims 150 lives a year.
Rates have almost doubled in the last 15 years and experts say sunbeds and
sunbathing without adequate protection are partly to blame.
Advanced malignant melanoma, the most dangerous form of skin cancer, is
notoriously difficult to treat once it starts to spread.
The US team, led by Dr Cassian Yee, from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research
Centre in Seattle, pioneered a new therapy based on infection-fighting
"helper" CD4 T-cells from the patient's own immune system.
Helper T-cells are specialised white blood cells that "target" foreign
invaders or cancerous cells, and marshal other elements of the immune system
against them.
The new technique involved extracting helper T-cells from the patient and
cloning those specifically targeting melanoma. They were then stimulated to
divide and multiply in the laboratory, boosting their numbers 3000 to
5000-fold.
Around five billion of the lab-grown cells were then infused back into the
patient, unaccompanied by any additional therapies.
After two months the patient was found to be tumour-free, and there was no
sign of cancer when he was last checked two years later.
Before treatment, the man had Stage 4 advanced melanoma which had spread to
a groin lymph node and one of his lungs.
Dr Yee said: "We were surprised by the anti-tumour effect of these CD4
T-cells and its duration of response. For this patient we were successful,
but we would need to confirm the effectiveness of therapy in a larger
study."
The patient had a specific type of immune system, and tumour cells producing
a specific "antigen" - the protein equivalent of a "flag" that is recognised
by the helper T-cells.
Dr Yee predicted that if the approach was successful in other patients, it
could be used for the 25% of late-stage melanoma sufferers sharing the same
profile.
The findings are to be published today in the New England Journal of
Medicine.
The cloned T-cells persisted for at least 80 days in the patient's body, the
researchers said. Even though only 50% to 75% of the tumour cells bore the
specific antigen "flag" recognised by the T-cells, all the cancer regressed
after the treatment.
The treatment may have caused the patient's immune system to broaden out and
recognise other tumour antigens, said the scientists.
Professor Peter Johnson, chief clinician of Cancer Research UK, said: "This
is another interesting demonstration of the huge power of the immune system
to fight some types of cancer."
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