VACCINES FOR PANCREATIC CANCER AND MORE ABOUT PROBLEMS OF DESIGNING CANCER TUMOR VACCINES

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Designing tumor vaccines presents a bunch of problems that anti-pathogen (that is a germ such as a virus or bacteria) vaccines don’t. Besides surgery for her cancer, Marilyn Horne, the renowned opera diva has received a pancreatic cancer vaccine at John Hopkins Medical Center. As you read in healty medical Blog (o.k I guess there is a small chance you read it elsewhere) Patrick Swayze, the much loved actor has a form of pancreatic cancer. He seems to be holding his own and in fact, will soon start filming a new series in Chicago.



Swayze is one of a number of recent celebrities said to have pancreatic cancer. Besides Swayze, Pavarotti and Marilyn Horne have had it. Besides surgery for her cancer, Marilyn Horne, has received a pancreatic cancer vaccine at John Hopkins Medical Center.



As the blog Mystery Rays from Outer Space, (no, really) points out "Designing tumor vaccines presents a bunch of problems that anti-pathogen vaccines don’t. One of those problems is identifying an appropriate antigen". An antigen is a molecule, such as on a cell that causes an immune response from the body. When your body recognizes a foreign antigen on say, a bacteria that invades your body, you generate an immune response. The cells of our body as well as bacteria and others substances can have antigens. In vaccines, they introduce an antigen into your body that causes the body to produce an immune response. There’s been a lot of interest in finding tumor antigens that cytotoxic T lymphocytes will recognize, and in fact hundreds have been identified. The database of tumor antigens at Cancer Immunity lists some 750 of them, divided into various categories":

Unique antigens result from point mutations in genes that are expressed ubiquitously. They are unique to the tumor of an individual patient or restricted to very few patients;

Shared tumor-specific antigens are expressed in many tumors but not in normal tissues;

Differentiation antigens are also expressed in the normal tissue of origin of the malignancy;

Over expressed antigens are expressed in a wide variety of normal tissues and over expressed in tumors



"Overall, shared tumor-specific antigens may be the ideal target. Because they’re found in multiple tumors, a vaccine can be pre-designed and go through a time-consuming optimization and validation process; because they’re only found in tumors, there’s less concern about safety. That is, the risk of the vaccine precipitating an autoimmune reaction to normal cells is low".

Side Effects of Tumor Vaccination

Studying Animals to See What Works Against Cancer in Humans


The results of the pancreas cancer vaccine and surgery together are encouraging.The pancreatic cancer vaccine is designed to enlist the immune system in the fight against pancreatic cancer.

The pancreas cancer vaccine is designed for people who already have pancreatic cancer. Usually most vaccines are designed as prophylaxis but this one is to help the body attack the disease."Now declared free of pancreatic cancer two years after diagnosis, Marilyn Horne adds another milestone to her long list of accolades: "Prima donna and survivor." Horne,who has never discussed her experimental cancer treatment publicly said she wanted to talk about it to help others facing the same illness".




"Horne began receiving the injections of lab-grown pancreatic cancer cells in early 2007, after surgery to remove the tumor. The vaccine has been genetically modified with an immune-boosting gene to tackle any lingering malignant cells. "Essentially, the vaccine teaches the immune system to recognize those pancreas cancer cells as being foreign and attack them specifically," says Dr. Daniel Laheru, a Johns Hopkins oncologist leading the study. "Her most important treatment was the surgery, but we hope the vaccine is additional insurance against recurrence."

Pancreatic Cancer Treatment Information at Johns Hopkins

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