Cancer vanishes for every patient in drug trial; Indian-origin patient among those healed completely. This might be an early glimpse of revolutionary treatment shift, says cancer expert
An Indian-origin patient was among those who had a “miracle” cure using a cancer medication that is being tried out by a research centre here, achieving an unprecedented healing rate when all 14 patients in the trial had their cancers healed, an IANS report in The Tribune, Chandigarh, saays.
“It’s a miracle”, Nisha Varughese said about the immunotherapy drug’s effectiveness in curing her.
In the trial at the Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSK) Cancer Centre in New York using dostarlimab, “the rectal cancer disappeared after immunotherapy — without the need for the standard treatment of radiation, surgery, or chemotherapy — and the cancer has not returned in any of the patients, who have been cancer-free for up to two years,” the MSK said.
According to researchers, this was the first time that all the patients in a cancer trial were completely healed with a medication and they did not have serious side effects.
The results of the trial were disclosed over the weekend in the New England Journal of Medicine and at a meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.
An editorial in the Journal called it “an early glimpse of a revolutionary treatment shift”.
MSK explained that “immunotherapy harnesses the body’s own immune system as an ally against cancer.”
According to researchers, this was the first time that all the patients in a cancer trial were completely healed with a medication and they did not have serious side effects.
It said, “The Immune cells contain a safeguard called a checkpoint, to prevent them from attacking normal cells. Cancer cells can trip this safeguard and shut down immune cells, allowing a tumour to hide and grow.”
Immunotherapy uses what is called a “checkpoint inhibitor” that frees immune cells to recognise and attack cancer cells, she added.
Varughese recalled discovering she was completely cancer-free: “That day I didn’t see the tumour. So, I was thinking, where is the tumour? Then, I thought maybe it’s hiding somewhere inside. Doctor told me, there is no more tumour. It’s a miracle.”
Andrea Cercek, a cancer specialist who ran the trial, said, “The immunotherapy shrank the tumours much faster than I expected.”
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