Today, the Science Translational Medicine journal published the article “Major Cancer Regressions in Mesothelioma After Treatment with an Anti-Mesothelin Immunotoxin and Immune Suppression” by Dr. Raffit Hassan of the NCI, former chair and current member of the Meso Foundation’s Science Advisory Board.
Dr. Hassan explains:
Very few treatment options exist for patients with mesothelioma who have failed chemotherapy. In this months issue of Science Translational Medicine scientists from the National Cancer Institute report a promising treatment that may benefit some patients with mesothelioma. This treatment involves an immunotoxin (which consists of an antibody linked to a potent toxin) SS1P developed in Dr. Ira Pastan’s lab at the NCI, that targets the protein mesothelin present on mesothelioma cells. In previous trials SS1P had limited activity since most patients developed antibodies against the drug. However, in the current study, led by Dr. Raffit Hassan at the NCI, using two other drugs, pentostatin and cytoxan, which suppress part of the immune system, they were able to give patients more doses of SS1P. Out of the 10 evaluable patients treated 3 patients had significant tumor shrinkage and all three patients are alive more than 18 months after starting therapy. In addition, 2 patients who had previously progressed on chemotherapy had a tumor response when treated with chemotherapy following SS1P. Although a small study, these responses in patients who had advanced treatment refractory disease are encouraging and the investigators plan to conduct a larger study to validate these results.
The abstract of the study can be found here. The article was also followed by an editorial by Dr. Ravi Salgia and Dr. Martin Sattler: Sci Transl Med-2013-Salgia-208fs38.
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