In a nutshell
The authors evaluated the effectiveness of the combination treatment of AdCD40L (a gene therapy and chemotherapy) in advanced melanoma. The authors found out that the gene therapy was well tolerated with beneficial treatment outcome.
Some background
In advanced melanoma (stage 3 or 4), the cancer spreads from the skin to other parts of the body. This is known as metastasis. Although several promising treatment options, such as immunotherapy and targeted therapy, are available for metastatic melanoma (MM), these treatments are also associated with moderate to severe side effects.
Immunostimulatory agents are a type of immunotherapy. These can be an alternate and safe treatment option in MM. Immunostimulatory agents are substances that stimulate the beneficial activity of immune system. AdCD40L is a virus-based immunostimulatory agent. It has shown effectiveness in treating other cancers. It will be important to find out the utility of AdCD40L in controlling MM.
Methods & findings
The authors aimed to determine the effectiveness of AdCD40L in combination with cyclophosphamide (INN, a chemotherapy) for the treatment of MM.
15 patients with MM were included in this study. For all patients, standard treatments had previously failed. In group 1, 6 patients received 4 weekly treatments of AdCD40L. In group 2, 9 patients also received 4 weekly treatments of AdCD40L. Additionally, they received cyclophosphamide before the first and fourth dose of AdCD40L.
AdCD40L was safe with mild adverse effects. At 6 months following the treatment, 17% of patients in group 1 were still alive. This was compared to 78% of patients in group 2. Patients with longer survival developed increased amount of beneficial immune T cells and decreased amount of harmful interleukin (IL8) cells, which promote cancer spread.
The bottom line
The authors concluded that AdCD40L combined with chemotherapy resulted in improved survival in metastatic melanoma patients.
The fine print
A larger patient population is needed for the results of this study to be widely applied.
Published By :
British Journal of Cancer
Date :
Mar 31, 2016
