immune checkpoint blockade

  • October 1, 2019  

    Liquid Biopsy to Determine Patient Response to Immune Checkpoint Blockade Bookmark

    George Lundberg, MD

    Article from The ASCO Post curated by Editor in Chief George Lundberg, MD, who notes: 

    Determining which cancers may be responsive to immune checkpoint inhibitors is problematic. These investigators discovered that liquid biopsy may provide an answer.

    Go to full article published by The ASCO Post.

    If you’re wondering whether this story applies to your own cancer case or a loved one’s, we invite you to get support from Cancer Commons.

  • May 21, 2019  

    Can You Improve Your Response to Certain Immunotherapy Drugs?

    Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Cancer treatments that use a strategy called immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) have entered clinical practice in a big way, with six drugs now approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for a variety of cancers. These drugs release “brakes” on the immune system, boosting its ability to kill cancer cells. Specifically, they target the proteins PD-1 or CTLA-4, which are found on… Read more »

  • October 22, 2018  

    Dual Neoadjuvant Checkpoint Blockade Feasible in Melanoma Bookmark

    Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt from MedPage Today:

    “Combination neoadjuvant immune checkpoint blockade therapy yielded promising outcomes in high-risk resectable melanoma, although toxicity was an issue, according to a phase II trial.

    “The combination of ipilimumab (Yervoy) and nivolumab (Opdivo) led to improved progression-free survival (PFS), distant metastasis-free survival (DMFS), and overall survival (OS) versus neoadjuvant nivolumab monotherapy in 23 patients with high-risk resectable melanoma, reported Jennifer A. Wargo, MD, of MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, and colleagues in Nature Medicine.”

    Go to full article published by MedPage Today on Oct 11, 2018.

    If you’re wondering whether this story applies to your own cancer case or a loved one’s, we invite you to get support from Cancer Commons.

  • December 21, 2017  

    A Gut Feeling: Bacteria in Your Gut May Affect Cancer Treatment

    Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    The human gut contains hundreds of species bacteria, which are known to contribute to various bodily functions (such as digestion, of course!) but they also shape our immune system. Now, recent research has revealed how our microbiomes (the abundant bacteria living in our bodies) may affect the efficacy of immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) in cancer treatment. How it started: about two years ago, an… Read more »

  • March 30, 2015  

    Is There a Future for Immunotherapy in Breast Cancer?

    Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Lately, immunotherapy—treatment that helps the body’s own immune system fight cancer—has made frequent appearances in news headlines. Indeed, researchers have reported remarkable clinical trial results for a new class of drugs known as ‘immune checkpoint blockade drugs’ in the treatment of metastatic melanoma, lung, and kidney cancers. Approvals from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the drugs Keytruda and Opdivo for melanoma and lung cancer have quickly followed. However, it may be that immunotherapies won’t work for all cancers, but only for those considered to be ‘immunogenic’; that is, cancers that trigger activation of the immune system. Researchers are studying different types of breast cancer to determine whether they are immunogenic, and what that might mean for their prognosis and treatments.