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Immunotherapy of prostate cancer is a treatment with drugs that activate the human immune system to fight cancer cells of the prostate tumor.
The prostate is a small gland that is part of the male reproductive system. Prostate is located just below the human bladder, where it surrounds the upper part of the urethra. The main function of the prostate gland is to secrete fluid that nourishes and protects sperm.
Traditional treatments for early prostate cancer include surgery and radiotherapy. Hormone therapy can lower the level of male hormones (androgens), which lead to tumor growth, and is also used to treat prostate tumors in the early stages. For advanced prostate cancer, chemotherapy is also a treatment option.
Immunotherapy (or immuno-oncology) is another new area of treatment for prostate cancer.
Immunotherapy used to treat prostate cancer is a type of ‘immune checkpoint inhibitors’ – a treatment that works to remove barriers that cancer cells place against the immune system’s control mechanism in order to evade it.
- In 2010, the FDA approved a dendritic cell vaccine called Sipuleusel-T (Provenge) for the treatment of prostate cancer. Provenge treatment has been shown to increase the survival of many patients with prostate cancer.
- Pembrolizumab (Keytruda®)* is a drug that targets PD-1-7, a checkpoint protein on immune cells called T cells that normally helps prevent these cells from attacking normal cells in the body. By blocking PD-1-7, this drug increases the immune response against prostate cancer cells. The drug is for metastatic prostate cancer in patients with high genomic instability (MSI-H) or DNA repair mechanism deficiencies (MisMatch Repair – dMMR deficient) and whose disease has progressed after four or more lines of treatment, and who are candidates for treatment with a drug from the checkpoint inhibitor family. The MSI-H/dMMR test to detect a decrease in the expression of proteins responsible for repairing errors in the genetic material of the tumor cell is for patients with advanced, unresectable or metastatic solid tumors, who are candidates for treatment with a drug from the checkpoint inhibitor family.
Currently, new immunotherapeutic drugs are being tested in clinical studies of prostate cancer. Some of them show impressive results.
Immunotherapy drugs are also used in Israel in the preparation of a personalized treatment regimen for each patient.
Individual treatment can be prescribed based on the results of new molecular genetic tests, during which the genetic profile of the tumor is compiled.
Related:
♦ Diagnosis of prostate cancer in Israel.
♦ Symptoms and risk factors of prostate cancer.
♦ Immunotherapy of prostate cancer is a treatment with drugs that activate the human immune system to fight cancer cells of the prostate tumor. ⇒ Immunotherapy for prostate cancer in Israel
⇒ Personalized Online Cancer Pre-Screening in Israel
If you want to know if you get the right treatment or whether there is a more advanced treatment than what you are currently receiving, and if immunotherapy is possible in your case, please contact us to get a second opinion of our leading doctor in prostate cancer treatment.
We will be happy to help.
