Cancer Treatment: Immunotherapy

Samir Jamil, MD

By Samir Jamil, MD

Our immune system is a collection of organs, special cells, and substances that help protect us from infections and some other diseases, like cancer.

Sometimes the immune system, however, has difficulty in targeting cancer cells, because the immune system doesn’t see the cancer cells as foreign because the cells aren’t different enough from normal cells (cancer begins when normal, healthy cells become changed and start to grow out of control). Or maybe the immune system recognizes the cancer cells, but the response might not be strong enough to destroy the cancer. And then finally, cancer cells themselves produce substances that keep the immune system from finding and attacking them.

Immunotherapy is a treatment that uses a person’s own immune system to fight cancer by boosting or changing how the immune system works so it can find and attack cancer cells. Immunotherapy has resulted in successful treatment of advanced cases of cancer like lung cancer, melanoma, bladder, kidney, and other cancers. Not every patient with cancer, however, benefits from immunotherapy.

Currently, immunotherapy is used to treat cancer in combination with chemotherapy, or it is used alone when the chemotherapy fails to treat certain cancers. Sometimes (in certain cancers) immunotherapy is used alone and upfront. The oncologist will decide if the patient is eligible for immunotherapy and when to utilize it.   

Some types of immunotherapy treatment that are available or are under research and development include cellular immunotherapies, a treatment method that powers the body’s own immune system to fight cancer by manipulating and reprogramming specific immune cells such as NK cells, tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes, and CAR T cells.

Cancer vaccines are another form of immunotherapy that educate the immune system about cancer cells, enabling it to recognize and destroy them. Immunomodulators are substances that adjust the immune system’s activity. They fine-tune the immune response.

A fourth type of immunotherapy is called oncolytic virus therapy; this method utilizes viruses that specifically infect and destroy cancer cells. These viruses are genetically engineered to target the cancer cells and spare healthy cells of the body.

And finally, we have targeted antibodies, which disrupt cancer cell activity and stimulate the immune system to eliminate the cancer cells.

Immunotherapy, although a new field, represents a major advancement in the fight against cancer. It’s a growing subspecialty of oncology that’s based on cancer immunology research. The progress that has been made brings optimism for a cure for all patients with cancer.