Dendritic cell therapy. Vaccination against cancer. Nijmegen research stimulates immune system in cultured cells. Article updated June 22, 2011
June 22, 2011: Please read the recently added information about Dr. Robert Gorter and Medical Center in Cologne this information: My experience with dr.Robert Gorter and the Medical Center Cologne. A warning
And click here for addresses of clinics in Germany, where dendritic cell therapy is given .
June 17, 2004:
In the Los Angeles Times published June 8, 2004 a background paper on dendritic cell therapy in trial form in the Radboud Nijmegen years running. There are now about 75 patients treated with dendritic cell therapy in cancer patients with melanoma, renal cell cancer and Kahler - Multiple Myeoloma. According to oncologist Professor C. Figdor This approach saves about 10 percent of patients. With permission from Wim van Hengel, thank you, we place the full article here.
Vaccination against cancer. Nijmegen research stimulates immune system in cultured cells.
Remove from the blood immune cells, tumor cells to target them and give them back to the cancer patient. The souped-up immune cells then find the tumor and attack this. With this treatment have been notable successes.
. "We call it immunotherapy," says Prof. TJM de Witte, internist, hematologist at the University Medical Centre Nijmegen St. Radboud (UMCN). The treatment is similar to vaccination. One difference is that vaccination takes place in order to prevent diseases. "What we do is to treat an existing condition, in this case cancer."
. White is the CEO of the foundation Nijmegen Tumor Immunology Laboratory (TIL). The foundation has several board members, including oncologist Professor C. Figdor, head of tumor immunology in the UMCN closely involved in the further development of immunotherapy.
. In this form of cancer known as dendritic cells play a central role. These cells, they are predominantly in the tissues, acting as scouts for the immune system and have many branches (the Greek word dendron for tree). They in turn have an extended cell surface to rest easily in contact with are foreign invaders. They sound the alarm when bacteria, viruses or cancer cells perceive.
. The dendritic cells to analyze the proteins on the cell membrane (the envelope of the cell), take proteins, break them and transporting them from the tissues in small pieces to other immune cells, called T-lymphocytes. Which are in large quantities in the lymph nodes. The lymphocytes then recognize the surface proteins and then look for the relevant bacteria, viruses or tumor cells in cancer patients to destroy. That is, if the immune system is functioning properly. And that's not the case in cancer.
. De Witte: "Cancer cells often occur even in healthy people. With them, they are cleared by the immune system, but is wrong in cancer. Their dendritic cells function less well. "
. The Nijmegen research team tries to do something by way of re-educating the immune system. The doctors of the treatment team meet them certain white blood cells from the blood of patients, called monocytes. They are the precursors of dendritic cells that occur mainly in the tissues.
. The monocytes in the laboratory with certain growth factors, grown into dendritic cells. Bring together researchers the cells in contact with synthetic counterfeit proteins from the cancer cells. These cells are thus their noses at the facts. They are then, usually just under the skin, again injected in the patients.
. The souped dendritic cells then present to T lymphocytes, which then becomes the surface proteins of the tumor cells and know an attack.
. Melanoma
De Witte: "In patients with metastatic melanoma, a dangerous form of skin cancer, we have clearly demonstrated that the method works. After returning the dendritic cells to the patient creates a colony of T-lymphocytes directed against cancer cells. They search for the melanoma. We have found large concentrations of T lymphocytes that attack the tumor. "
. In cancer patients currently participate in the Nijmegen study, the conventional treatment is not excited. They are still the center of life, but they do have a deadly ailment.
. Arienne Paasse, a historian of 37, is one of about 75 patients in the meantime by De Witte and his team have been treated. When she was 27 she discovered one of her legs skin cancer. It turned out to be a melanoma, an aggressive form of skin cancer. The tumor wasremoved, but two years later, there was a metastasis in the left groin. Many lymph nodes were removed. Unfortunately, two years later appeared another melanoma, now the other leg. Further metastases were found lodged in the intestines and the right groin. These lymph nodes were also removed. Then chose Paasse for dendritic cell therapy in Nijmegen.
. "The treatment hit well," said Paasse few weeks ago in the women's magazine Flair. Now she is more than four years and mother of a six months old baby. "She responded very well to therapy," said De Witte.
. This is not always the case. Tumor cells, as it were invisible for T-lymphocytes, thus preventing destruction. De Witte: "That's the uncertainty we face. A patient may initially respond well to treatment. Over time, however, tumor cells undergo metamorphosis, so the immune cells are no longer recognizable. It is also unlikely that this treatment will work for all types of tumors. "
. The research team is yet so certain tumors such as melanoma, renal cell carcinoma and Kahler's disease (multiple myeloma). The successes were mixed. White puts the cautious: "For about 10 of the 75 patients we saw a good response to treatment. In half of these patients the response was more than a year. This treatment offers little side effects, just some temporary redness and swelling around the injection site in the skin, just like a regular vaccination. "
. The dendritic cell therapy is currently still an experimental treatment and the additional costs must be funded from research funds. Three per treatment involves a sum of around 15,000 euros. The research of De Witte and his colleagues has been fairly successful with fundraising. Nijmegen entrepreneurs see perspective in the treatment and have the Nijmegen Offensive Against Cancer (discussed) was established. Last Friday, presented the platform. The NOTK in 2005 through a number of actions under the "city of Nijmegen 2000 years' additional fundraising for the TIL and the University of Nijmegen.
. The Nijmegen group has no double-blind study conducted with two groups of patients with one or the other group untreated. "We are now into the second investigation and therefore look which patients respond to treatment. Within three to five years we expect to start double-blind study. "
. Other centers
Nijmegen is not the only player on the field of dendritic cell therapy. There are contacts between the Nijmegen research group and colleagues at the VU University Medical Centre in Amsterdam. It often requires small-scale events. Lack of money is a brake. So broke the VUmc a promising study on vaccination of cancer patients with their own killed cancer cells in 2002 for this reason.
. In the Cologne Medical Center, a private clinic, has been quite some experience with dendritic cell therapy. More than 500 cancer patients have been treated in recent years under the leadership of the Dutch anthroposophical doctor Robert Gorter. He studied at the University of Amsterdam and was self testicular cancer, but cured by a mistletoe treatment and fever therapy, despite the existence of metastases in lungs and stomach, as he reports on his institute's website (www.koelner models. s) on which much information can be found on the dendritic cell.
. Gorter combined treatment of tumor cells, sometimes with heating (hyperthermia), a diet or other treatments for effectiveness. He also writes for vitamins and minerals. Treatment is not cheap. A course of six subcutaneous injections in Cologne-the-usual approach is to more than 18,000 euros (3060 euros per injection). The costs are so high because, according to Gorter is a very labor-intensive treatment. It varies from one insurer or (part of) the treatment is reimbursed.
. Also in Germany, just across the Dutch border, working internist-haematologist Professor J. Atzpodien in Fachklinik Heather Horn in Münster. This private clinic, various treatments applied, including the dendritic cell.
. Later in Germany, in Göttingen, Prof. A. Kugler, a urologist at the University of Gottingen, active in this area. In March 2000 he reported in the journal Nature Medicine, his first successes in seventeen patients with kidney cancer in the final stage. After 21 months were fourof the seventeen patients recovered fully. In two other patients, the number of tumor cells by more than half.
. Six months later made the universities of Mannheim, Heidelberg and Zurich, Switzerland announced a similar result in sixteen patients with skin cancer in the final stage. Two patients recovered completely and two others, the number of cancer cells by more than half. For others it had little effect.
. Dendritic cell therapy seems promising one, although more research is needed. De Witte: "I think immunotherapy eventually will be an additional part of the standard treatment for cancer."
