New cancer research pioneered by memorial Sloan Kettering shows a strong alternative to chemotherapy, surgery and radiation for some forms of cancer.
Nearly 80% of patients suffering from a variety of cancer types were successfully treated only with immunotherapy, according to a new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
The immunotherapy protocol successfully treated 100% of patients with rectal cancer involved in the court.
“My husband, Tommy and I were preparing for the worst,” recalled Maureen Sideris, who was diagnosed with gastroesophageal intersection cancer in 2022 and then became a trial participant.
“After being treated only with immunotherapy, I had no cancer evidence and I should not be subject to surgery, chemistry or radiation,” she said in a press release of MSK. “I felt like I won the lottery!”
Dr. Andrea Cercek, a gastrointestinal oncologist, overseen the study along with his gastrointestinal oncologist Dr. Luiz Diaz.
The duo tried to develop this approach in part because of the negative impacts of traditional treatment, according to the release.
“Use of standard treatment of care for surgery, radiation and chemotherapy to treat rectum cancer is effective,” Cercek said.
“But treatments can leave infertile people and severely affect the functions of the intestines, urine and sexuality, as well as other aspects of everyday life.”
Participants in court were all patients with tumors ranging from stage 1 to stage 3, which means that the tumors had not yet spread, the release said.
The tumors also had a genetic mutation called with a lack of mismatch repair (MMRD), which makes them particularly vulnerable to a type of immunotherapy called “control point inhibitors”.
This therapy “does not make tumor cells, MSK declared, making it easier for the patient’s immune system to recognize and kill cancer cells.
The first clinical test test the therapy started with only 18 patients, all had rectum cancer.
“We knew there was a wide range of cancer types that had the same MMRD genetic mutation,” Cercek said. “We hoped this approach could help people face these other cancers too.”
In the extended trial, which contained 103 patients, there were 49 patients with rectum cancer and 54 patients with other types of cancer. Participants received intravenously intravenous control point infusions of the checkpoint, according to the release.
In all 49 patients with rectal cancer, there was no test of cancer after immunotherapy.
Of the 54 patients with other cancers, 35 saw all signs of cancer disappear after therapy, according to a series of tests performed for the study.
“This is a very significant answer, and the results were even better than we had hoped,” Cercek said. “We found out that some types of cancer responded extremely well to immunotherapy, including colon and stomach cancer.”
In 20% of patients with non-rectal cancer who still needed post-therapy surgery, researchers saw that immunotherapy often shrinks the tumor and even reduced the phase classifications of some of the tumors, according to Cercek.
Timothy YAP, Ph.D., a medical oncologist at the University of Texas Cancer Center MD Anderson, agrees that the effectiveness of treating immunotherapy for numerous types of cancer is “exciting”.
“We are always seeking to improve treatment strategies for patients with cancer through innovative clinical evidence, and this is no exception,” YAP, who was not involved in the study, told Fox Digital.
“Patients who responded can avoid the need for surgery, chemotherapy and radiation therapy, and benefit by improving the quality of their lives,” he said.
Based on the results of the original test with rectal patients, the approach to immunotherapy is only included in the Comprehensive National Cancer Network Treatment Guidelines, which is the group of doctors who establish cancer treatments in the US, the release said.
Some of the original trial participants of 2022 are still without cancer today, many years after the initial treatment.
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