A new form of therapy is changing the way blood cancers, also called lymphomas, are treated.
Analysis investigating a blood cancer known as “diffuse large-cell B-cell lymphoma (LBDGC)” found that 51% of patients receiving “chimeric antigen receptor (CAR-T) T-cell therapy”, also known as ” axi-cel”, were still alive two years after the start of their treatment.
No adverse effects
The study, led by physicist Sattva Neelapu, was presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Hematology. “This two-year evaluation demonstrates that axi-cel can induce durable remissions in a significant proportion of patients,” said Sattva Neelapu. Following a median follow-up of 27.1 months of 101 patients, the study found that 83% of patients achieved a treatment-related reduction in cancer activity. No adverse effects related to axi-cel were reported after 12 months of follow-up.
Chimeric antigen receptor T cell therapies (CAR-T) are changing the way of treating several types of aggressive blood cancers (or lymphomas, editor’s note), which are resistant to current treatments. They are made by taking a patient’s own T cells (immune system cells), modifying them to be able to kill cancer cells, and then introducing them back into the patient’s immune system.
Transformative therapies
“These are transformative therapies and we are seeing them increasingly helpful in giving patients the ability to live when they have virtually no treatment options left,” said oncologist Joseph Alvarnas. and hematologist. “At the same time, we are identifying the limitations of these therapies. For example, CAR T-cells may stop functioning in some patients for a variety of reasons, which has prompted researchers to consider what therapeutic combinations could be used to prolong the benefits treatment.”
axi-cel therapy has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration of the United States for the treatment of LBDGC in October 2017 and by the European Commission in August 2018. Representing 25 to 30% of non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas, diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (LBDGC) is the most common lymphoma. It is classically diagnosed after the age of 60, but can occur in children and young adults.
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