Immunotherapy Emerging As Treatment For Lymphoma

Today’s typical treatments have been unable to cure numerous types of lymphoma, but emerging immunotherapies could provide the key to fighting cancerous cells in precise ways.

Active immunotherapies trigger the body’s immune system to combat cancerous cells. Passive immunotherapies use immune system components like antibodies generated outside the body to fight tumors.

Now researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital are claiming that active and passive immunotherapies could hold the key to fighting lymphoma both now and in the future. This is especially true for passive therapies used to treat Hodgkin’s lymphoma - as standard immunotherapies have failed one-third of patients suffering from the disease.

“If these treatments are able to cure lymphoma, we would be delighted,” said Dr. Joshua Brody, director of the study.

Active versus passive

Researchers stated that active immunotherapies are already an industry standard for many forms of cancer. The treatments have shown promise during clinical trials in fighting hard-to-treat diffuse large cell lymphoma.

In fact, recent studies claim that patients who did not respond well to other treatments showed response rates of over 80 percent when receiving passive immunotherapies.

“If [the treatments] are effective, but not good enough to cure lymphoma, if they are able to push off a patient’s need for chemotherapy, or radiation therapy, or other standard therapies, that would still be pretty gratifying for some of our patients,” said Brody.

Source: Lymphoma News Today