It is in Toulouse, in the very modern Oncopole, that the history of the fight against melanoma is writing a new page. For 5 years, doctors have raised their heads in the face of this skin cancer responsible for 66,000 deaths per year worldwide. Immuno-oncology has changed the prognosis by obtaining remissions: these new treatments change the prognosis in more than 70% of cases. What to do for the 30% in whom the treatment fails? Help the defense system slowed down by inflammation. The explanation of this simple and brilliant idea whose verification is in Toulouse.
Another medical world first to be credited to France. Due to stubbornness and thoughtfulness.
It is two researchers like France has many, more motivated by the beauty of reflection and the advance of medicine than by honors and money who have developed this very promising essay, in a field where the hope is important: the improvement of results in melanoma, a fearful skin cancer because it too often causes metastases and of which an explosion of cases is expected, especially in women, due to a very close link with summer exposure to the sun. A Professor of Dermatology, specialist in this cancer at the Toulouse hospital that the Pourquoi Docteur teams know well. Professor Nicolas Meyer is in fact already associated with the fight against this cancer and with the numerous victory announcements published for 5 years in the world congresses of oncology where we meet him. Today, it is impossible to imagine a successful team in oncology without associating with the doctor a specialist in biology, that is to say someone capable of watching and understanding the microscopic fight that is played out. inside the body between the cancerous cell, powerful, super-armed, and the immune forces of our body that must be reorganized and strengthened thanks to drugs. This is the reason why the announcement of this world first was made by professors Nicolas Meyer, the clinician, and professor Bruno Ségui, researcher in biology at the Oncopole in Toulouse.
Anti-inflammatory drugs to help patients resistant to new treatments
In France we don’t have oil … but ideas! The formula applies perfectly to this work
On the one hand, we have the formidable immuno-oncology drugs which have solved 70% of melanoma cancers (and many other cancers because they represent an unequaled wave of hope in the world of cancer). They “boost” the natural defense system of man, the immune system, which is often modified by the cancer itself, by helping the soldiers of the immunity, which are the T lymphocytes, to recognize and destroy the cell. cancerous.
Very targeted weapons, the first examples of which date from the beginning of the 2010s. With results never seen in oncology.
70% is an astonishing result … But the others those who do not respond? There are several hypotheses. one of the most logical is that of inflammation. In addition to hiding from T lymphocytes, the cancer cell causes a very violent inflammatory reaction when attacked, which has the consequence of reducing the response to the anti-cancer drug.
And this is where the second family of exceptional drugs arrives, that of anti-inflammatory drugs with the idea of giving, in combination, anti-inflammatory drugs. NOT those of everyone that we give in rheumatism or sprains. Not those who, for their part, have also changed the face of dramatic diseases: inflammatory rheumatism which bears barbaric names such as rheumatoid arthritis, spondylitis or psoriatic arthritis but which resonate with admiration in hundreds of thousands of patients for whom life has completely changed.
These are the anti TNF alpha. But beware, their potency goes hand in hand with the potential side effects.
It was necessary to have the idea and then the authorization to combine the power of these 2 treatments. This is now the case in Toulouse.
See you in two years …
The press release from two French researchers is clear: They announce the trial in 18 patients of the addition of an anti-TNF alpha to oncoimmunological treatment. Ambition, but also prudence. They make an appointment in two years, to find out if the experiment is effective, safe and therefore generalizable to all patients with melanoma.
And probably in the long term to all those who will be undergoing immuno-oncology treatment. A considerable challenge and eagerly awaited by the quality of the reasoning and of those who apply it.
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