New Vaccine Appears Safe, Effective.(allogeneic granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor vaccine stimulates immune response against pancreatic tumors)

2001 MAR 14 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) --

by N.R. Saltmarsh, staff medical writer -- A vaccine that stimulates an immune response against pancreatic tumors appears to be safe and effective in humans.

The ability to prolong disease-free survival seems related to the size of the dose of the allogeneic granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF) vaccine, which was developed by E.M. Jaffee and colleagues at Johns Hopkins University.

The success of this type of vaccine has already been established in the mouse, but its efficacy against human tumors is uncertain, Jaffee et al. reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

The study enrolled 14 patients with pancreatic cancer who had already undergone surgery for their tumors. Subsets of patients were given different doses of vaccine eight weeks post-surgery. Three received 1x10(7) vaccine cells, five received 5x10(7) cells, three received 10x10(7) cells, and five received 50x10(7) cells.

Following completion of a course of chemotherapy and radiation, six of the patients were still in remission. They were given another course of vaccine at the same dose used previously ("Novel allogeneic granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor-secreting tumor vaccine for pancreatic cancer: A Phase I trial of safety and immune activation," J Clin Oncol, 2001;19(1):145-156).

Three patients who had received >= 10x10(7) vaccine ...