After a lengthy 6-month treatment process, cancer appears to have vanished in participants of the trial, undetectable through health checks, endoscopies, PET scans, or MRIs.
According to RT news agency, patients with rectal cancer participating in a small drug trial in New York (USA) received unexpected results after undergoing immunotherapy treatment.
The trial results were published in the New England Journal of Medicine a few days ago.
All participants in the trial had rectal cancer and were treated over a 6-month period with an immunotherapy drug. (Illustrative image).
According to the report, all 18 patients involved in the trial had locally advanced stage II and III rectal cancer (meaning the tumors had metastasized in the rectum and sometimes to lymph nodes but not to other organs), and also had a rare gene mutation.
They received treatment for 6 months with an immunotherapy drug costing approximately $11,000 (254 million VND) per dose, administered every three weeks.
Dr. David Agus, a contributor to CBS News, explained that this drug works by “exposing” cancer cells so that the immune system can identify and destroy them.
“In simple terms, this is an immunotherapy that blocks the ‘don’t eat me’ signal on cancer cells, allowing the immune system to eliminate them,” Agus said.
One of the trial participants, Sascha Roth, told the New York Times that she was preparing to go to Manhattan to begin several weeks of radiation therapy when she unexpectedly received the test results following the drug trial. The results indicated that Roth had been cured of cancer.
“I told my family, but nobody believed me,” Roth said.
The same phenomenon occurred with other patients involved in the trial. Cancer seemed to have disappeared in these individuals, undetectable through health checks, endoscopies, PET scans, or MRIs.
One of the authors of the article, Dr. Luis A. Diaz Jr. from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, told the New York Times that he had never known of another study where a treatment could completely eliminate cancer in every patient.
“I believe this is the first time this has happened in cancer research history,” Dr. Luis A. Diaz Jr. stated.
Patients in the trial showed no signs of cancer even after more than 6 months of follow-up, meaning they no longer required standard cancer treatments such as surgery, radiation, or chemotherapy. The disease was reported to have not recurred in any of the patients. These patients have been cancer-free for a period ranging from 6 to 25 months after the trial concluded.
It is also important to note that no patients experienced severe side effects from the drug, unlike what they might have endured if they underwent surgery, radiation, or chemotherapy.
Having achieved initial success, researchers agree that this trial needs to be replicated in a larger study, as previous trials focused only on patients with rare genetic markers in their tumors. However, the 100% remission rate among patients is an extremely promising initial sign.
The next trial is expected to include approximately 30 patients, providing a broader picture of the safety and effectiveness of the new drug.
