Dr. David McKean and Colleagues from Mayo clinic, is working on improving the host immune system by increasing the T cells by giving Anti-retroviral therapy with tumor components so that it produces immune cells specifically against the Cancer cells.
Anti-retroviral therapy has shown effective treatment against HIV treatment, by stimulating T cells against the virus by increasing the number of immune cells in the body which is made to fight against the Virus. The same principle of immune boosting is being worked against cancer cells with tumor specific molecules inserted into the antiretroviral therapy system so that T-cells are produced against the cancer cells. Developing a therapy against cancer has been difficult as tumors produce soluble products which hamper immune system. But Anti-retroviral treatments boost the production of T cells and augment the effect of cancer vaccines in eldery or immune suppressed patients, and produce an effective immune response treatment.Professor John Toy of Cancer Research said: "There's a lot of promising early research suggesting that it may be possible to adapt the body's immune defense system to recognize cancer cells and destroy them and the real challenge in immunotherapy is to generate T cells able to identify cancer cells and kill them and not be deceived into ignoring them as acceptable versions of normal cells."
(Source: BBC News.)
