A woman from England has become the first patient in the world to receive a new vaccine that doctors hope could significantly improve the treatment of some forms of advanced lung cancer, reports the BBC.
Chris Jones (68) is taking part in the clinical trial at the Clatterbridge Cancer Centre in Liverpool, in which the vaccine uses cells from her own tumour to help create a synthetic DNA it’s hoped will make immunotherapy far more effective.
Jones has advanced non-small cell lung cancer, which accounts for more than 80% of all lung cancers.
While her immunotherapy has helped to some extent, it has not worked well enough, said medical oncology consultant Dr Carles Escriu, adding that this was a problem for about half of the patients they treated.
“Such patients will have an initial response to the immunotherapy but eventually the cancer learns how to become resistant. So what we want to do is boost the immune system, hoping we can achieve this long-term response.”
Tailor-made
Jones has agreed to take part in an early stage clinical trial which will be looking at whether that can be done, and had volunteered “because I obviously want to live longer if I can, and if it helps other people in the future then that’s a bonus – for everybody”.
Her vaccine was made specifically for her, with scientists using a biopsy from her own tumour to map the DNA of her cancer. That information was then used engineer the vaccine. using synthetic DNA.
That DNA is known as “doggybone” because of its unusual shape.
Researchers say it is faster and cheaper to produce than normal bacterial DNA, which also makes individually-tailored vaccines potentially more achievable for the NHS.
Many organisations, including the University of Liverpool, the Clatterbridge Cancer Centre, NHS Blood and Transplant, and specialist genetics and immunotherapy firms, have collaborated for months to reach this point.
Jones will find out in six weeks’ how well the vaccine has worked. Only 10 people will take part in this early stage trial, receiving seven doses over the next 24 weeks.
The two professors jointly leading it, Christian Ottensmeier and Natalia Savelyeva, hope it will improve care for more than half of patients with advanced lung cancer.
Ottensmeir said the aim was to help the immune system recognise and fight tumours that have previously evaded detection.
BBC article – Lung cancer patient first in world to get new vaccine (Open access)
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