Doc: We’re fighting cancer..and chemo
Irish expert says our own immune cells are key to conquering disease How does CAR-T treatment work?
Professor Martin Pule CAR-T cells that are effective treatments for as wide a range of cancers as possible. “Ultimately what we want to do is get rid of chemotherapy and bone marrow transplantation.” To date CAR-T cell therapy, which is still at the early stages of use in cancer treatment, has mainly been used on leukaemia and lymphoma cancer. The first patient treated with CAR-T therapy was six-year-old Emily Whitehead who had aggressive leukaemia that did not respond to chemotherapy.
Emily, who was close to CAR-T is a treatment in which a patient’s T cells are changed in the laboratory so they will attack cancerous ones. T cells are taken from a patient’s blood then Bubble glows death when she was given the experimental treatment, is now 12 and cancerfree. Dr Pule said: “We’re exploring a lot of different aspects of CAR-T cell treatment from trying to treat different kinds of leukaemia and lymphomas and also trying to treat some solid tumours. “There is a huge amount of interest in bringing CAR-T cell treatment into solid cancers. “That is a little more challenging. The cancers are more complicated and solid cancers tend to put up better defences against the immune system than leukaemias and lymphomas. “My personal feeling is where we are with CAR-T cell treatment in solid cancer is kind of where we were with leukaemia and lymphoma about seven or eight years ago.” 10 Things To Know About is on RTE One tomorrow at 8.30pm. news@irishmirror.ie Host Aoibhinn Ni Shuilleabhain & Averil Power the gene for a special receptor that binds to a certain protein on the patient’s cancer cells is added.
The CAR-T cells are grown in the laboratory and given to the patient by infusion. Don at work