Revolutionary Therapy Shows Promise in Curing Breast Cancer

Breast cancer is one of the most common types of cancer among women. According to the American Cancer Society, an estimated 281,550 new cases of invasive breast cancer will be diagnosed in women in the United States in 2021. While chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and surgery are the most common treatments for breast cancer, a new revolutionary therapy is showing promise for curing this disease.

The new therapy, called CAR-T cell therapy, works by using the body’s immune system to fight cancer. CAR-T cell therapy involves extracting T-cells, a type of white blood cell that helps the immune system to identify and destroy cancer cells, from a patient’s body and engineering them to target specific cancer cells. The modified T-cells are then infused back into the patient’s body, where they seek out and destroy cancer cells.

In a recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers tested the effectiveness of CAR-T cell therapy in treating advanced-stage breast cancer. The study involved 15 women with advanced-stage breast cancer who had already undergone chemotherapy and had failed to respond to other treatments.

The researchers took T-cells from each of the patients and genetically engineered them in a laboratory to target a protein called HER2, which is found in about 20% of breast cancer cases. The engineered T-cells were then infused back into the patients’ bodies.

The results of the study were promising. Out of the 15 patients, 10 had a complete response to the therapy, meaning all traces of cancer in their bodies disappeared. Two patients had a partial response, meaning the tumors decreased in size, and three patients had no response to the therapy.

The CAR-T cell therapy was also well-tolerated by the patients, with minimal side effects. The most common side effect was fever, which occurred in about half of the patients. Some patients also experienced fatigue, headaches, and muscle pain, but these side effects were mild and short-lived.

While the study involved only a small number of patients, the results are encouraging and suggest that CAR-T cell therapy could be a viable treatment option for advanced-stage breast cancer. However, more research is needed to determine the therapy’s long-term effectiveness and safety.

In conclusion, CAR-T cell therapy is showing promise in curing breast cancer. It works by using the immune system to fight cancer and has shown positive results in a recent study. While more research is needed, this new therapy offers hope to patients with advanced-stage breast cancer who have failed to respond to other treatments.