ADVANCES IN DRUG DEVELOPMENT Current Developments in Oncology Drug Research

摘要

YN The goal of tumor vaccines, a type of immuno-therapy, is to stimulate the immune system in order to recognize and eliminate cancer cells. There are various strategies in immunotherapy; some use cancer cells from the patient, some use cancer cell lines, and others use proteins and peptides. Immunotherapy has been viewed as an experimental therapy until very recently. In April 2010, sipuleucel-T (Provenge, Dendreon) was approved for men with advanced prostate cancer. This regulatory approval provided some proof that immunotherapy could be used for treatment of cancer, and in the next 5-10 years, we expect many therapeutic cancer vaccines to be approved. At present, there are approximately 20 multiple type vaccines (ie, cancer cell-, protein-, and peptide-based vaccines) being investigated in phase III trials. This discussion will focus on peptide-based vaccines.