Immunotherapy: What you need to know

Not all that long ago, chemotherapy was the only option to treat most advanced (metastatic) cancers. Because these drugs work by destroying rapidly dividing cells, they harm some healthy cells — such as hair follicles — as well as cancer cells. In the past two decades, cancer treatment has been transformed by targeted drugs and the emergence of chemotherapy. Targeted drugs are designed to home in on specific genes or proteins that are altered or overexpressed on cancer cells. Immunotherapy has been very successful for certain types of advanced cancers, such as lung, bladder, and skin cancers. One form of immunotherapy is called an immune checkpoint inhibitor. It takes the brakes off immune cells, unlocking their ability to detect altered proteins on cancer cells in order to attack and kill these cells. These drugs include programmed death (PD-1)-inhibitors and PD-L1-inhibitors (such as pembrolizumab, atezolizumab, nivolumab), and cytotoxic T-lymphocyte antigen (CTLA)-4 inhibitors (ipilimumab). The speed of FDA approvals for these drugs has outstripped the general understanding of their effects, and side effects, raising many questions for people who have cancer — and even for many physicians. If you’re receiving immune checkpoint inhibitors, or wondering about them as part of cancer therapy, here are some facts you should know. Does immunotherapy benefit all patients? Immunotherapy benefits some, but not all, cancer patients. It seems to work better for certain cancer...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Cancer Immunotherapy Managing your health care Source Type: blogs