Immunotherapy for glioblastoma: a long and winding road

摘要

There has traditionally been discomfort with our current strategies to treat patients with gliomas, not only because their efficacy has remained limited despite undisputable progress, but also because a cure using a conventional combination of surgery, radiation therapy, and chemotherapy is still a distance away. This is, at least in theory, different for immunotherapy. In fact, clinical trials of immunotherapy, including various courageous local treatment approaches, have a long tradition in neurological surgery throughout the world. Accordingly, there are ongoing efforts to understand and circumvent the immunosuppression associated with glioblastoma and to design novel, more effective, but safe strategies of immunomodulation.