Immunotherapy is the Future of Cancer Treatment
Step aside chemotherapy. Immunotherapy is the future for cancer treatment.
In a previous post I wrote about my own experiences with chemotherapy. To summarize, getting chemotherapy sucks. Sure, chemo will kill cancer cells but it also kills other things. Hair, skin, tastebuds - anything fast growing gets killed too. Chemo also has other nasty side effects such as infertility and kidney damage. All that, and chemo is no guarantee to eradicate all of the cancer. In my case the chemo worked okay, but I still had to have surgery afterwards.
At the same time I was receiving my treatments, I made friends with a woman receiving treatment for diffuse large b-cell lymphoma (DLBCL). That's an aggressive, fast-growing cancer that can be difficult to treat. Lymphoma is also a more common type of cancer, with approximately 70,000 new cases each year in the U.S.[1] Following her progress has exposed me to exciting new ways combating cancer.
What is Cancer Immunotherapy?
Unlike chemotherapy, immunotherapy specifically targets cancer cells. This has the potential for much more effective treatment, and without the nasty side effects.
Immunotherapy is treatment that uses certain parts of a person’s immune system to fight diseases such as cancer...researchers have found ways to help the immune system recognize cancer cells and strengthen its response so that it will destroy them.[2]
Normally, the body's immune system is not effective at fighting cancer. The immune system's main function is to eliminate foreign substances from the body. Unfortunately, cancer cells start out as regular cells in the body. The immune system has a hard time differentiating healthy cells from cancer cells and doesn't know to attack them. Current research has been focusing on either training a patient's immune system to fight cancer or introducing man-made immune system proteins.
New Types of Immunotherapy
Traditionally vaccines have not existed for cancers. Only recently have successful vaccines been developed. For some types of cancers, dead cells can be taken from a tumor and modified. These modified cancer cells are then reintroduced to the patient and will cause their immune system to attack the cancer. The main drawback with this type of vaccine is that it must be done on a patient by patient basis (this is what's called an autologous vaccine) [3]. Vaccines are being researched for many of the common types of cancers such as lung, prostate and breast.
Cancers can also be treated with antibodies created by the immune system. An antibody is a protein that neutralizes another specific protein, called an antigen. The antibody attaches to the target and signals the immune system to attack that location. Researchers develop and clone antibodies to target specific cancer antigens. When grown in the lab, these are called monoclonal antibodies (mAbs)[4]. mAbs can be used on their own, or combined with other treatments to improve odds of success.
CAR T-Cell Therapy
CAR T-Cell is an exciting new immunotherapy that is currently in clinical trials [5]. T-Cells are yet another part of the body's complex immune system. For the therapy, T-Cells are removed from the patient and genetically altered in the lab to have special chimeric antigen receptors (abbreviated CARs). Lymphoma is one cancer that could be potentially treated with CAR T-Cell therapy. Unfortunately, my friend could not get into a clinical trial to try this new method. She will have to stick with traditional radiation and high dose chemo. I was disappointed to hear that news, but the clinical trials are not without their own risks.
After being grown in a lab, billions of CAR T-Cells are reintroduced into a patient undergoing therapy. These are potent, living cells that will reproduce and move throughout the body. These T-Cells can even treat hard to reach places such as the central nervous system, where cancer can hide out after treatments[6]. When combined with traditional methods, CAR T-Cell therapy can reduce the chances of relapses.
As with any new therapy, there are certainly kinks to work out. T-Cells release cytokines. Cytokines are:
A type of protein that is made by certain immune and non-immune cells and has an effect on the immune system. Some cytokines stimulate the immune system and others slow it down. They can also be made in the laboratory and used to help the body fight cancer, infections, and other diseases.[7]
With millions of CAR T-Cells being introduced all at once, a rapid build up of cytokines can occur. This leads to fevers and and sharp drops in blood pressure. Still, CAR T-Cells can produce quick results. Sometimes in as little as one month, the cancer can be eradicated[8]. Expect for CAR T-Cell therapy to be in the news more in 2017 as more trials are completed [9]. I look forward to a future where chemotherapy is no longer needed. One day, children may get a simple set of vaccines to completely prevent cancers. Exciting times in cancer research!
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Thank you for sharing, have you ever heard of colloidal silver?
Yes I have. Colloidal silver has no documented health benefits and plenty of documented health risks. The FDA has banned its use as a medicine and it can only be sold as a "dietary supplement".
do your own research and stop relying on appeal to authority.
this is not medical advice.
this is so useful for so many things. i used it as part of my protocol. i learned to make my own.
Colloidal silver is good for you. Did you buy a machine? I've been looking at buying one.
I researched for about a month and finally decided on the method used by: http://www.sota.com/ called "Silver pulser". It contains the circuit I want, and I didn't want to chance screwing it up building it myself. I was in a hurry, after spending all that time researching. I got a kit that included the Colloidal Silver circuit, blood electrification circuit, EM pulse coil, and an ozone generator. It saved my life.
If you want to attempt building this, here is a bit of information with schematics:
http://www.bobbeck.com/pdfs/beck-protocol-handbook.pdf
you can find extensive tutorials on how to build, on youtube.
I found other methods that use tap water or added salt, but I did not think these were wise due to the inability to control the chemical contaminants in either. the method I chose uses distilled water, and takes longer, but produces the results that I want. Be careful about this. If done incorrectly, it can be toxic, or turn you blue.
This is my experience and is not medical advice.
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Excellent post, getting the immune system to better target cancer cells hopefully is the future of cancer treatment! Very nice write up on CAR-T cells, you did a great job explaining what they are and what their potential is for the non science reader.
As a bonus, and in addition to resteeming for exposure. We are awarding you a small 10 Steem Power deposit as a thank you for creating quality STEM related postings on Steemit. We hope you will continue to educate us all!
Thank you @steemstem! I appreciate what your account is doing. You do a great job of curating science posts.
I read this and all of your cancer posts with great interest.
I'm glad you found them interesting. I was nervous about writing on such a personal topic, but the whole process has been good for me to do.
nice
how much does it cost? i got rid of my lymphoma and prostate cancer in 6 weeks for less than $2000, no doctors needed. the only thing they had to offer was chemo anyway.
this is not medical advice.
Oh really? sighs
yes, really, and the cool thing is that, unlike my brother who died of the same two cancers, I am alive to sigh. so keep doubting and sighing. I'll stick with real science and logic, and leave the appeal to authority to those who can't do the research themselves.
this is not medical advice.
Very nice, very well written and very informative post! Thanks for sharing! I only knew about hadrotherapy as one of the possible future for cancer treatment! Glad to have learned something new!
Thank you! This is an exciting time for cancer treatments.
Treating cancer is one thing - ensuring that we never get it should be the focus and that is quite easy to do.
They can't make money from us if we aren't sick - that's one of the main reasons that we have cancer. Our government and corporations have been poisoning us and giving us cancer for over 100 years and they have known it all along. They've known it since at least 1808.
Cancer is largely avoidable. Not completely, there are exceptions. Cancer is predicted to jump by 50% in the next 10 years - we should be asking why.
This post will verify the points that I have made