by Introduction
Over the last few decades significant progress has been made in developing new cancer treatments. One of the most promising areas is immunotherapy drugs which help stimulate the body’s own immune system to fight cancer in a more targeted way. These drugs are revolutionizing cancer treatment and improving survival rates for several types of cancers.
What are Immunotherapy Drugs?
Immunotherapy Drugs help boost the ability of the immune system to detect and destroy cancer cells. The immune system plays a crucial role in defending against diseases but cancer cells have often developed ways to evade detection by the immune system. Immunotherapy drugs help overcome these evasion mechanisms used by cancer cells. There are different types of immunotherapy drugs that work through different mechanisms:
Checkpoint Inhibitors
Checkpoint proteins like PD-1 and CTLA-4 act as brakes on the immune system. Cancer cells can exploit these checkpoints to avoid detection and destruction by T cells. Checkpoint inhibitor drugs like pembrolizumab, nivolumab and ipilimumab target these checkpoints and release the brakes to allow T cells to attack cancer cells. This helps overcome tumor-induced immune suppression. Checkpoint inhibitors have shown remarkable success against various cancers including melanoma, lung cancer and bladder cancer.
CAR T-cell Therapy
In CAR T-cell therapy, T cells are collected from a patient’s blood and genetically engineered to target specific antigens on cancer cells. They are then infused back into the patient to actively seek out and destroy cancer cells expressing those antigens. Currently approved for some leukemias and lymphomas, this personalized form of immunotherapy is showing promise against other hard-to-treat cancers.
Cancer Vaccines
Cancer vaccines bolster the immune system’s response against specific proteins or antigens expressed by cancer cells. They work by training the immune system to recognize these antigens as foreign and mount an attack. Therapeutic cancer vaccines given after diagnosis can help the immune system wipe out any remaining cancer cells and prevent recurrence. Prostate and HPV-associated cancers have seen successful vaccine approaches.
Adoptive Cell Transfer Therapy
In adoptive cell transfer therapy, immune cells are removed from a patient’s tumor and expanded in the lab. These tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) which have already demonstrated an ability to recognize the patient’s cancer are then infused back to induce an anti-tumor response. This therapy has achieved durable responses in melanoma patients.
Areas Where Immunotherapy is Making an Impact
Immunotherapies like checkpoint inhibitors have revolutionized treatment in some cancers with durable responses and improved survival. Some of the notable success stories so far include:
Melanoma
Checkpoint inhibitors have become a standard first or later line of treatment for advanced melanoma based on significantly improved response rates and survival benefits compared to chemotherapy. Combination immunotherapy is pushing response rates even higher and improving long-term outcomes.
Lung Cancer
Both non-small cell and small cell lung cancers have seen major advances from checkpoint inhibitor drugs. For some patients who previously had limited treatment options, immunotherapy has extended life expectancy from months to years in many cases. Trials are exploring combination approaches.
Bladder Cancer
Checkpoint inhibitors are now a standard first-line option for advanced or metastatic bladder cancer that has traditionally had poor outcomes. They have significantly improved response rates and are helping more patients live longer.
Head and Neck Cancers
Immunotherapies like pembrolizumab have received approvals for recurrent or metastatic head and neck cancers that have not responded to platinum-based chemotherapy based on improved overall survival compared to standard chemotherapy in clinical trials.
Expanding Application and Combination Approaches
Based on the strong and durable responses seen in certain cancer types, immunotherapy drugs are now being evaluated widely across various other cancers. Additionally, combination approaches that enlist other cancer treatment modalities like chemotherapy, targeted drugs and radiation are being intensely investigated.
Some leading research directions include:
– Combining two or more immunotherapy drugs that utilize different mechanism, like checkpoint inhibitors paired with cancer vaccines.
– Combining immunotherapy with chemotherapy or targeted drugs to help induce immuno-genic cell death and expose more antigens to activate the immune response.
– Combining immunotherapy and radiation therapy which can boost immunogenic cell death and tumor antigen levels.
– Exploring novel combination regimens in difficult-to-treat cancers like glioblastoma, ovarian cancer, triple negative breast cancer and pancreatic cancer.
– Combining immunotherapies with other innovative platforms like oncolytic virus therapies, adjuvants, and personalized neoantigen vaccines.
– Development of new drug classes like IDO inhibitors, 4-1BB agonists, and LAG-3 inhibitors that boost anti-tumor immunity in distinct ways.
Immunotherapy is revolutionizing cancer treatment by empowering the body’s natural defenses to target and eliminate cancer in a long-lasting way. Significant progress has already been made against several cancer types. Continued research on combination regimens and newer drug targets promises to expand the impact of immunotherapy across many other cancers over the coming decade. These drugs offer unprecedented promise for improving survival and quality of life for cancer patients around the world.
*Note:
1. Source: Coherent Market Insights, Public sources, Desk research
2. We have leveraged AI tools to mine information and compile it
