Immunotherapy in the clinic Flashcards
What is BCG in immunotherapy, what does it cause and what does it reduce?
- BCG is a live tuberculosis vaccine
- It causes immune activation
- It reduces risk of local bladder cancer occurrence
Generally what can be said on antibodies for immunotherapy?
- Widely used as therapy to inhibit proteins
- Can induce an immune response
- But can cause anaphylaxie or anti-drug antibodies
What is CAR-T cell therapy, what is it approved for and what are the risks?
T-cells are extracted from the patient, chimeric antigen receptors (CARS) are transfected, the cells are expanded and re-injected into the patient
Approved for lymphoma
Risks: cytokine storm, neurological complications and hypogammaglobulinemia
What are checkpoint inhibitors in immunotherapy and what are the antibody targets?
- Immunological checkpoints that can inhibit an immune response
- Antibodies against CTLA-4, PD1 and PDL1 (checkpoint inhibitors)
- Approved for several cancers
What can be said on the amount of side effects of checkpoint inhibitors and chemotherapy and their tolerability?
They have the same amount of side effects but checkpoint inhibitor side effects are more tolerable
What can be said on the combination of different therapies for cancer treatment?
The more we combine the treatment the better the survival rate (PD1 inhibitors + CTLA4 inhibitors + chemotherapy + etc.)
What is the toxicity problem linked with immunotherapies and does it affect the treatment?
Autoimmunity, mainly dermatitis and gastro-intestinal tract (gastritis, pancreatitis, etc.)
It does not affect the treatment
What are the 5 types of disease evolutions linked with immunotherapy?
- Hyperprogressive disease (worst)
- Progressive disease
- Nondurable response (gets better only for a short while)
- Pseudoprogression (gets worse only for a short while)
- Durable response (best)
In immunotherapy what are predictive markers?
They are markers that predict disease presence/progression (like PDL1 expression)
