George Kumar: New Hope for Liver Cancer Patients
George Kumar, Senior Director at AstraZeneca, shared on LinkedIn about a recent paper by Yuk Ting Ma et al. published on AACR Journals:
“New hope for liver cancer patients: The ImmunoTACE Trial.
Addition of Dendritic Cell Vaccination to Conditioning Cyclophosphamide and Chemoembolization in Patients with Hepatocellular Carcinoma: The ImmunoTACE Trial
A phase II study led by the University of Birmingham has shown that adding a dendritic cell (DC) vaccine to standard transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) nearly doubled progression-free survival for patients with intermediate-stage hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) — 18 months vs. 10 months.
TACE = targeted chemo + blood supply cut-off, delivered straight into the liver tumor.
- The vaccine is made from a patient’s own white blood cells, expanded ex vivo with tumor antigens, and reintroduced to boost the immune system’s ability to recognize and attack cancer.
- Results, published in Clinical Cancer Research, mark the first controlled clinical trial to show improved outcomes with a cell-based vaccine in HCC.
- Importantly, this strategy could also synergize with immune checkpoint inhibitors, a fast-growing area of research in liver cancer.
Quotes: Courtesy of University of Birmingham, University Hospitals Birmingham, Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust and Aintree University Hospital and Clatterbridge UK
- Prof. David Adams (Chief Investigator): ‘These results are very promising and could offer a new treatment option for patients with primary liver cancer, one of the leading causes of cancer-related deaths worldwide.’
- Dr. Yuk Ting Ma (Lead author): “Dendritic cell vaccines show strong potential as an additional immunotherapy. Future studies will explore combining them with checkpoint inhibitors to improve outcomes in liver cancer.’
The next step: larger randomized trials to validate these findings and explore DC vaccines in combination with checkpoint blockade.”
Title: Addition of Dendritic Cell Vaccination to Conditioning Cyclophosphamide and Chemoembolization in Patients with Hepatocellular Carcinoma: The ImmunoTACE Trial
Authors: Yuk Ting Ma, Jianmin Zuo, Amanda Kirkham, Stuart Curbishley, Miroslava Blahova, Anna L. Rowe, Camilla Bathurst, Homoyoon Mehrzad, Salil Karkhanis, Pankaj Punia, Martin W. James, Nick Stern, Ankit Rao, Diana Hull, Faye Lowe, Panagiota Sylla, Luke Webster, Syed Hussain, Christina Yap, Daniel Palmer, David H. Adams.
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