Personalized Melanoma Vaccine Could Prevent Cancer Regrowth

An innovative melanoma personalized vaccine, tailored to genetic mutations present in the malignant cells, shows promising results when used with an immunotherapy drug, as the  patients who received this treatment after surgery for melanoma remain free of cancer 18 months longer than the ones who did not receive the vaccine.

The cancer vaccines aim at inducing a targeted immune response by the T cells against specific antigens or proteins expressed on the surface of tumor cells and not on the healthy cells, this precise attack being the biggest challenge when developing this kind of therapies.

“That would be a milestone for the cancer vaccine field, which has struggled for decades to show results. It could also add to a growing arsenal of drugs, known as immunotherapies, that harness the immune system to fight cancer.”

SOURCE: https://www.science.org/content/article/personalized-vaccine-melanoma-may-stave-cancer-s-return

CREDITS: SCIENCE JOURNALS