Vaccine Spurs Strong Immune Response in Advanced Cases

Harvard Medical School

In a small clinical trial of nine patients with stage III and IV kidney cancer, a personalized anti-tumor vaccine generated robust immune response, according to findings of a new study led by HMS researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

  • By BETH DOUGHERTY | Dana-Farber Communications

The patients had a form of kidney cancer called clear cell renal cell carcinoma and were deemed at high risk for recurrence due to the advanced stage of the disease.

The research, funded in part by the National Institutes of Health and U.S. Department of Defense, is published Feb. 5 in Nature.

The nine patients, two of whom had metastatic disease and seven of whom had advanced, high-grade disease, were part of a phase 1 clinical trial. Such early-stage trials are designed to determine the safety and optimal dosage of a treatment and to establish whether and how well patients respond to the therapy before further testing in more people.

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