press release: 2-step ovarian cancer immunotherapy made from patients' own tumor shows promise

press release

Trial benefits three-quarters of patients

WASHINGTON, D.C. — As many as three quarters of advanced ovarian cancer patients appeared to respond to a new two-step immunotherapy approach -- including one patient who achieved complete remission -- according research from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania that will be presented today in a press conference at the AACR Annual Meeting 2013 (Presentation #LB-335).
The immunotherapy has two steps – a personalized dendritic cell vaccination and adoptive T-cell therapy. The team reports that in the study of 31 patients, vaccination therapy alone showed about a 61 percent clinical benefit, and the combination of both therapies showed about a 75 percent benefit.....

..... "This is the first time such a combination immunotherapy approach has been used for patients with ovarian cancer, and we believe the results are leading us toward a completely new way to treat this disease." Both treatments are given in conjunction with bevacizumab, a drug that controls the blood vessel growth that feeds tumors. Combining bevacizumab with immunotherapy makes a powerful duo, Kandalaft says. The vaccine trial is still open to accrual to test new combinatorial strategies.