US brain cancer vaccine trial underway

The study will evaluate the addition of the vaccine following standard therapy with surgery and chemotherapy in patients with glioblastoma multiforme, a deadly form of brain cancer.

The vaccine, called DCVax-Brain, incorporates proteins found in patients' tumours and is designed to attack cancer cells containing these proteins. The study underway at NYU Medical Center is an expansion of an earlier phase I trial of the vaccine. The vaccine is made by the Northwest Biotherapeutics, based in Bothell, Washington.

Despite surgery and chemotherapy, patients with glioblastoma multiforme brain cancer typically survive about 15 months. Even if only a small number of tumour cells are left in the brain, that is enough for these fast growing and aggressive tumours to grow back. The tumours do not grow elsewhere in the body.

The vaccine is intended as a kind of immunotherapy. The trial will enrol patients aged 18 to 65 years old with newly diagnosed glioblastoma multiforme brain cancer who will receive standard primary treatment with surgery followed by radiation with concurrent chemotherapy. Enrolled patients will be randomised to receive the standard of care, and others will receive the standard of care and the vaccine.

The vaccine will be made from the tumours and immune cells of each patient. When a patient's tumour is removed during surgery it will be shipped to a laboratory where the tumour cells will be broken up to prepare the first component of the vaccine.

Separately, patients' dendritic cells, a powerful type of immune cell, will be obtained and sent to a laboratory for purification. Dendritic cells may be able to teach the immune system to recognise and destroy cancer cells. The patients' tumour cell material is combined with the dendritic cells to form the vaccine.

"We are really excited about the promise of this vaccine," Dr Patrick Kelly, the chairman of the NYU School of Medicine Department of Neurosurgery, said. "Everything now depends on something in addition to surgery so that these tumours do not recur. A cancer vaccine like this may make a difference in extending life and maintaining a good quality of life."

Source: New York University Medical Center and School of Medicine