Brain Tumor Vaccine Shows Promising Results

ScienceDaily is reporting that a new vaccine used in the treatment of a cancer found primarliy in the brain is showing promising results after an initial trial at the University of California. "Of the 12 patients being treated, eight can currently be evaluated for overall survival, while four are still receiving treatment. Seven out of the eight patients have exceeded the historical median benchmark of 6.5 months survival from time of recurrence. The investigators will continue to follow the patients for overall survival. Based on these results, a larger, multi-center phase 2 study is planned for late 2007."

Comments

IT'S NOT A TUMOR!!

[PinkBird]

had to be said!!!

Re:IT'S NOT A TUMOR!!

[vimh42]

Having had a brain tumor as a child, I cannot express enough how annoying it is anytime somebody quotes that.

Re:"an initial trial at the University of Californ

[jimstapleton]

it is imprecise, not necessarily inaccurate. I had that as early as high school chem, and several times in college as well. Unless you are suggesting they can't do anything by themselves... Which I hope you aren't...

Vaccine?

[Grashnak]

I know they use the word vaccine in TFA, but my understanding of a vaccine (plus a cursory glance at a dictionary) suggests that a vaccine should be something you administer in order to prevent someone from getting a disease, rather than something you use to treat a person who already has the disease.

Any of you bright science boys or girls know what the difference is between a "vaccine" and any other drug you might use to treat a diease? Just wondering.

Re:Vaccine?

[Anonymous Coward]

This particular cancer "recurrs".

The vaccine is made from the previously cut-out cancer cell of that patient,
and is used to prevent recurrence.

Re:Vaccine?

[DebateG]

A vaccine is any substance that stimulates your immune system to attack a pathogen specifically. It stimulates what is known as the adaptive immune system, which is the part of the immune system that recognizes a specific infection. For example, you may be infected with Hepatitis A, and that generates a nonspecific inflammatory response. Later on, your T and B cells "learn" to specifically begin attacking the Hepatitis A virus. If you get infected with Hepatitis B, you still have the nonspecific inflammatory response, but your learned response against Hepatitis A doesn't help here; it's very specific for Hepatitis A.

In contrast, most drugs don't prime your immune system against specific proteins on the pathogen. Chemotherapy drugs tend to just kill rapidly dividing cells non-specifically; you get nausea because the normal cells in your gut are also killed. There are some drugs such as monoclonal antibodies that can specifically attack and kill the pathogenic cells, but they don't work by priming your immune cells.

It's a misconception that all vaccines prevent you from getting the disease. The BCG vaccine for TB doesn't really prevent you from getting infected with TB chronically; it prevents you from getting a really severe kind of acute TB. In fact, some vaccines are actually administered after you've already been infected. For example, the rabies vaccine causes a brisk immune response against rabies. You usually receive it *after* you've been bitten by a rabid animal, so there is already rabies virus replicating within your cells. It helps you clear the virus that is already there.

I hope this helps.

Meaningless Statistics

[w.p.richardson]

Presumably this is a therapeutic vaccine, since survival data is reported. Don't think you could get this as a prophylactic vaccine in order to ward off future brain tumors.

As for the statistics, the fact that 7/8 have exceeded the historical median survival is fairly meaningless. I'm sure that historical literature could be produced to provide equivalent results in a single small study. Also, at a single site, you have no insight into the selection criteria for the patients enrolled... Were they selected because they were highly likely to survive (e.g., early stage disease)? Is the investigational site vested in the therapy (likely the case, at least for a principal investigator)?

Will be interesting to see what phase 2 studies bring - hopefully it works out as well as they describe here, but if history is any judge, that is probably not going to be the case.

Re:Meaningless Statistics

[flynt]

Well I of course agree with your sentiment, calling the results "meaningless" isn't quite right either. They have some meaning, even if they are based on a small sample. For instance, if all 8 patients died the day of their first dose of vaccine, would you call that meaningless? If you read the article, all the actual investigators understand this is only a Phase I study, but that's where everything starts off. I agree, so many things that seem promising do not work out when done in a large trial, so excitement should be tempered until then. Your criticisms of this study would be valid if it were a Phase II/III trial, but this one clearly wasn't designed to show efficacy.

Re:"an initial trial at the University of Californ

[w.p.richardson]

Isn't Cal Berkeley the University of California? That's how it's commonly referenced outside of CA.

Re:A pre-emptive 'you insensitive clod' comment...

[RingDev]

I'm with ya there man, I lost a close friend in high school to a brain tumor. ...to go from worrying about your learning permit to worrying if you'll live to Christmas. It is nothing I'd wish on any one, let alone a child.

-Rick

Immune response booster

[jbeaupre]

My crude understanding has been that vaccines are intended to amplify the immune response to pathogens. This can happen before or during a disease (prophylactic or therapeutic according to Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaccine

Re:"an initial trial at the University of Californ

[Anonymous Coward]

Cal-Berkeley is the flagship of the UC System. As a result, it is known as Cal or UC for athletic events which the others get UCLA or something else. Think of Texas or Tennesse or Michigan or North Carolina as an example.

UCSF is an incredible place that only does medical research. There is no undergrad program. One of the best hospitals in the country. You should check out the amount of NIH funding they get.

Re:"an initial trial at the University of Californ

[drinkypoo]

Isn't Cal Berkeley the University of California? That's how it's commonly referenced outside of CA.

No. It's called "UC Berkeley". The "University of California" is a system of Universities handled by one accrediting body.

Referring to any individual UC campus as "The University of California" is simply inaccurate, regardless of what others might say, unless you are explicitly talking about the UC system.

Of course, slashdot "editors" don't actually edit, even if they knew things like this, which I don't think they do (based on their own story submissions.)

So we the people have to notice things like this - but of course I got modded offtopic, even though my comment is about the story (well, actually the story submission.)

Further proof that the slashdot moderation system does not work.

As if we needed any.

Now, if you are in a given town, one colloquially refers to the local college as "the UC" or "UC". I grew up in Santa Cruz, so UC Santa Cruz was simply abbreviated to "UC". But that's not a proper usage, it's shorthand. If I was speaking for the benefit of an audience, I would always refer to it at least as "UCSC".

Re:It's not a tumah!

[drinkypoo]

Why don't we put forth the same heroic visionary goal for our entire society that we put for going to the moon forty years ago and "smokin' out ter'ists" these last six years?

Because construction (halliburton) and oil (everyone) companies don't profit from curing cancer.

In fact, the latter causes cancer, even directly from refinery emissions.

There's lots of things we don't do because there's no way to make money on them, or because we're making money on the status quo. For example, legalization of drugs. We all know that it would reduce crime. And of course, there's the supposed issue of terrorism - they claim that buying drugs funds terrorism, which is highly likely in fact. Buying imported drugs will necessarily be funding terrorism part of the time, it only makes sense. But the war on some drugs is highly profitable for a wide range of people. It also helps protect the plastics and tree paper industries by preventing large-scale production of hemp fibers and oils.

Re:It's not a tumah!

[Seumas]

Yes, but we fund many forms of social welfare (not just corporate welfare). Other than feeding people, what could be a greater social welfare concern than curing a slew of the greatest sicknesses man has ever known?

Really, our society has advanced to the point where we have the resources to do a lot of great things that will benefit everyone. We just seem to lack the will. And while it's nice to think private industry will do it, they're not going to cure cancer, because a cancer cure won't make them rich. They'll lose money. And even if they simply stumble upon some sort of "prolong your life" drug (you know they don't care to CURE it of course), it won't be for decades.

Re:"an initial trial at the University of Californ

[rbanzai]

Are you thinking of plain old USC?

The UC system is broken down like the poster said. UCLA, UCSD, etc. They are also frequently described as "UC San Diego, UC Santa Cruz, UC Irvine."

USC is not part of this state system.

Re:"an initial trial at the University of Californ

[wperry1]

UCSC = UC Santa Cruz

Cell Phones

[SnarfQuest]

Does this mean we can use our cell phones again?

Re:Cell Phones

[chowdy]

please think of the bees!

Nice

[the eric conspiracy]

But gliomas are comparatively rare compared to metastatic brain tumors. How about something to treat metastatic cancer, guys?

Re:Nice

[fatboy]

My father died last year from non-small cell lung cancer. He had brain metastasis in his language center and thalamus. He had aphasia that was cured after radiation and a contentious use of large amounts of Dexadron. It was a very short five months, and I am glad he had some relief from the months-long headache he endured before treatment.

My mother-in-law was diagnosed with a rare type of glioma a month ago. My wife and I were expecting it to be a benign tumor. We were devastated by the diagnosis.

Any new cancer treatments or research are good, IMHO.

Re:Nice

[the eric conspiracy]

I lost my mother to metastatic breast cancer 2 months ago. Part of that process was surgery followed by radiation to try to control brain mets. Unfortunately her aphasia was only temporarily relieved by this treatment. The disease ravaged her terribly - she lost motor control in one arm, the other had 2nd degree lymphedema from treatment of a cancer in her shoulder making it essentially useless. She lost the ability to walk, a tumor on one femur caused a broken hip that was inoperable. Eventually it was attack on her lungs that was fatal. It was 12 years between the time of original diagnoses of breast cancer until her death. It took 8 years for the first signs of metasticy to express.

People rarely die of metastatic brain tumors; it is the systemic attack that is fatal, eventually a critical organ becomes involved. I saw recently that John Edward's wife Katharyn now has this disease. It is a hard road they face.

Cautious Optimism

[CrazyTalk]

As someone who has a brain tumor (not a glioma, but still malignant) I keep a sharp eye out for new developments. It seems like every other day a new "cure" is announced, but there is a LOT more work to do. Still, this is a good sign and the more research that goes on the better. Even if this ultimately doesn't prove to be as big a help as it initially appears to be, its one step closer. One thing that these types of treatments DO do, which is often overlooked, is prolong the life (And improve the quality of life) of people with the disease, making it something that is "managed" like say Diabetes as opposed to just being a death sentence. I'm 4 and a half years out of what my doctor told me was a 3-5 year life expectency, and I fully intend to beat that by a wide margin.

Re:Cautious Optimism

[talljuan]

me too!

In my case, after the resection of my tumour (a gangliglioma) nearly 3 years ago, my prognosis does not anticipate any further development for the forseable future. However, there is no way to fully discount the possibility of a recurrence, so I do like to keep tabs on the field. If something starts to redevelop, I'd sure like to know of alternative treatments so I don't have to get any more holes drilled into my skull!

BTW, this work sounds related to that done by my neurosurgeon Dr Linda Liau and her team at UCLA (Westwood).

Best of health to you!
-j

Re:Cautious Optimism

[Capt Xano]

Going on 6 years after the first resection of my high-grade glioma in 2001. There is life after brain tumors, and it's reassuring to know that there may be options if it ever comes back.

Other vaccinations for cancer

[AlpineR]

This vaccination to treat brain tumors sounds similar to earlier research for treating skin cancer with vaccination.

I am a colon cancer patient myself, having been through surgery, radiation, immunotherapy, and three kinds of chemotherapy over the past three years. Last fall I was contacted by NIH about participating in a new trial to test customized vaccinations for metastatic colon cancer. The protocol is pretty scary. First they extract white cells from your blood stream. Second, they knock out your immune system with some nasty chemotherapy. Meanwhile in the lab they genetically modify the white cells to recognize your tumors. Finally, they reinject you with the modified cells to establish an immune system that will attack the cancer.

Ultimately I was rejected as a participant due to characteristics of my tumors. I was disappointed not to be able to receive a possibly miraculous treatment, but it was also a relief to avoid a nasty ordeal.

I am also watching with interest a different type of vaccination treatment. Researchers are vaccinating subjects against CEA, a common protein involved in colon cancer and other cancers. It's potentially much simpler, since the vaccination is against CEA in general rather than having to be customized for each patient.

AlpineR

Re:It's not a tumah!

[Unc-70]

I sympathise to a degree, such money would be better spent fighting disease rather than wars against fellow humans. However, it might be worth a look at the history books. See The War on Cancer

I will also ask for an appropriation of an extra $100 million to launch an intensive campaign to find a cure for cancer, and I will ask later for whatever additional funds can effectively be used. The time has come in America when the same kind of concentrated effort that split the atom and took man to the moon should be turned toward conquering this dread disease. Let us make a total national commitment to achieve this goal. America has long been the wealthiest nation in the world. Now it is time we became the healthiest nation in the world.--President Richard M. Nixon in his 1971 State of the Union address.

The sad fact is that finding a cure for anything, and cancer in particular, is really, really hard.

Oh, so THAT's what Phase 2 is!

[QuantumPion]

If this drug pans out, we all know what phase 3 is! ;)

Hilarity!

[pclminion]

Of the 12 patients being treated, eight can currently be evaluated for overall survival

That's the politest way of saying "They're dead" that I've ever heard.

Yes, money will solve everything.

[Stickerboy]

>Yes, but we fund many forms of social welfare (not just corporate welfare). Other than feeding people, what could be a greater social welfare concern than curing a slew of the greatest sicknesses man has ever known?

>Really, our society has advanced to the point where we have the resources to do a lot of great things that will benefit everyone. We just seem to lack the will. And while it's nice to think private industry will do it, they're not going to cure cancer, because a cancer cure won't make them rich. They'll lose money. And even if they simply stumble upon some sort of "prolong your life" drug (you know they don't care to CURE it of course), it won't be for decades.

O RLY?

For the record, the US federal government spends $28 billion on medical grants through the National Institutes of Health. Per year. According to Wikipedia, the NIH through the National Cancer Institute sponsored the research of two-thirds of the available cancer drugs we have. And that's not counting state-funded research, or private grants.

Just like all the celebrities who made it their mission in the 1990s to preach, "let's throw more money at curing AIDS!", more money (or more "will", as you like) will not always equal a better solution, simply because the basic research is not there yet. Contrary to your opinion, there are hundreds of thousands of doctors and doctors-in-training who would love to be known as the one who cured a particular type of cancer. Even the ones that work for Big Pharm. The basic scientific problem is that many cancers are the body's own cells, with a few restrictions on growth removed (see Nowell's Law). How do you target and kill that without killing your patient? And that's the conundrum.

There have been many advances in cancer research, despite what laypeople will tell you. Many cancers caught in Stage I or even Stage II are curable with multimodality therapy (surgery, chemo, radiation). Which is why cancer screening is such a hot topic in medical literature now. Gardasil and other anti-HPV vaccines in the works have the potential to cure all or most cervical, penile, and scrotal cancers (all have an etiology that starts with HPV). Five years from now, I predict we'll be talking about Epstein-Barr Virus-associated cancers in the same way. The majority of juvenile cancers, like Wilm's tumor or ALL, can be cured. Society could cure 90%+ of future lung cancer by throwing away their damn cancer sticks.

But you would never know the amazing progress being made, because tens of thousands of anonymous researchers and doctors working in labs around the world to find the cure for "cancer" (that's like saying, find the "cure for sports injuries" or the "cure for autoimmune diseases") isn't sexy. What they say doesn't fit in a convenient seven-second sound-bite. Haven't people been working on cancer for centuries, where's the damn cure already?!? And wouldn't you rather know about the latest on Paris Hilton, or watch the latest Grey's Anatomy, or go play some more World of Warcraft instead?

Re:Yes, money will solve everything.

[Stickerboy]

OK, Mr. Coward. I'll bite. I've got time to burn.

>Granted, you've proved yourself to be a complete idiot, but a great many researchers (and not merely those itching for grants on a personal level) have stated that they could probably cure X,Y or Z disease (cancer is often mentioned) with a certain amount of money and that the only thing holding them back is the necessary funding to move forward as quickly as society would like.

Really. Pray tell, show me how money is going to get you through Phase I, II or III clinical trials any faster than usual. (Of course, corruption would probably work, but I don't anyone rational wants for US R&D to function that way.) Tell me how money buys you personally the insight to see the problem of targeting the average metastatic clump of cancer cells in such a way that a solution presents itself. And you can't. Because the basic science isn't there yet.

>And wow! We spend a whole $28b on medical grants through the NIH per year! WOW! Is that really some significant number to you? We spend 51% of our national budget on the military. Our military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan will have cost us the better part of a trillion dollars over only six years. $28 billion split among all medical grants... verses a couple hundred billion rebuilding some other nation that we engaged in over false pretenses.

Danger, AC, danger! Straw man alert! Oh noes! We're pouring money down a rathole in Iraq! But you've yet to show how throwing more money at cancer research will "cure cancer" one second faster!

>I'm not satisfied with "advances" every few years. We dedicated ourselves to hitting the moon within a decade. And we did it. Surely with enough funding, we can make the same dedication to certain health concerns rather than depending on Bill Gates to do it for us.

Did you read my original post? Any bit of it? There are genuinely underfunded diseases that need research out there. There are a few ultra-rare cancer types that could probably use some more money, but a bigger problem would be finding the researchers, and patients, to work the problem. Cancer in general is not underfunded. If you don't like the pace of research, why don't you get a MD/PhD yourself and become a hero?

Since you seem unfamiliar with the space program, listen closely. Going to the moon was an engineering problem. An expensive and complex engineering problem, to be sure, but all the basic science to do so had already been worked out. Curing cancer, on the other hand, is not.

>All of your points are fine. Whatever. There is nothing one can say that can change the fact that we're spending a thousand percent more on a ridiculous military effort that benefits NOBODY that could serve a greater benefit for countless people for the rest of existence if that money was spent on preserving life.

Blah blah blah, blah blah, blah blah blah. Tired of waving your scarecrow? Would I rather spend the money from the Iraq War on, say, subsidies for the American uninsured? Sure! It'd be a lot more productive than either throwing it away in Iraq, or spending it on already funded cancer research.

>I'm not some fucking bleeding heart. I'm simply a pragmatist.

ROTFL!!!1!11eleventy-one! No, please. Stop. Go back to playing World of Warcraft.

>Spend half a trillion dollars DEFENDING our country rather than attacking another (meanwhile leaving our own country generally undefended) and spend the other half on something more beneficial.

Sounds like you have an axe to grind, and one that has nothing to do with cancer research.

Re:Insightful!

[Grashnak]

I said:

Thanks, thats very clear. If I could mod you up I would! Not that I care, but why on earth would someone mod that down?

Re:Insightful!

[Petra_von_Kant]

I_just_can't_help_it ..............

You must be new here ..........

"You've got a chart filling a whole wall with interlocking pathways
and reactions to shock and the researcher says "If I can just control
this one molecule/enzyme/compound I'll stop the whole negative
physiologic cascade of post haemorrhagic shock." Yeah, right."

It's not rare enough

[trigggl]

This is the type of tumor I had. If you read the article you'll notice that it says the recurrence is always fatal. My tumor was treated with chemo two years ago. I've readjusted my 401K plan because I don't know how much longer I'll be around. Forgive me if I don't share your opinion.

I'm assuming that metastatic cancer is already high on the priority list anyways.

It means something to me

[trigggl]

These statistics mean a great deal to me. Even if it's 7/8 out of 100, that's still better than 0 out of 100. If it turns out to be a 60% chance, I'll take that over 0% any day, month or year. I was diagnosed with a glioma after my wife found me at midnight having multiple seizures on the living room floor. My kidneys shut down and the doctors were talking transplant. Fortunately they started back up again, but I think I would rather die than go through chemo again. It was furtunate(God), also, that my tumor was low grade. I'm hoping that when it comes back it will still be low grade. I'm due for an MRI. The first couple MRIs after I stopped chemo were very stressful(scary).

Read the Article

[trigggl]

"Of the 12 patients being treated, eight can currently be evaluated for overall survival, while four are still receiving treatment. Seven out of the eight patients have exceeded the historical median benchmark of 6.5 months survival from time of recurrence. The investigators will continue to follow the patients for overall survival. Based on these results, a larger, multi-center phase 2 study is planned for late 2007."

What I get from that is that they can't include 4 of them in the results yet. I don't see anywhere in the article anything that suggests any patients in the study passing. I would think that they would want to be clear on that in a study. You can get sued for giving people false hope.