Re: HER2 and Immunotherapy Studies for reference
 

Andrea,
I think the studies vary in what is allowed. I applied to a "presurgery" immunotherapy trial. It is intended for those who have not had any treatment at all....yet. Other studies allow some treatments and some are intended to be given after all traditional treatment has been used.

Re: HER2 and Immunotherapy Studies for reference
 

A good list of cancer immunotherapy drugs based on clinical trials (no date observed)
https://www.dolcera.com/wiki/index.p...&format=single


Description of immunotherapy options, good background:

http://www.cancer.net/navigating-can...-immunotherapy

Re: HER2 and Immunotherapy Studies for reference
 

"The immunotherapeutic AE37 is designed to work indirectly by stimulating the patient's immune system to recognize and kill cancer cells. An advantage of AE37 is that it potently activates a subclass of immune cells, known at CD4+ T cells, to recognize the tumor-specific HER2 protein. This subclass of T cell has been shown to be critical in generating a robust, long-lasting and effective immune response. AE37 consists of a fragment of the tumor-associated HER2 protein modified by a proprietary platform technology developed by Antigen Express scientists."

Generex Provides Update on Antigen Express Phase II AE37 Breast Cancer Vaccine Trial
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-relea...300036824.html


I read about it in this discussion thread here whereAntigen Express, NeuVax and AE37 are mentioned. I really don't understand what the delay is in getting these drugs to market.

http://seekingalpha.com/author/rich-steffens/comments


As it is current vaccines on the CDC schedule aren't 100% effective so who decided to set such a high bar for breast cancer immunotherapy? It seems like market dictates are behind some of this.

Re: HER2 and Immunotherapy Studies for reference
 

Seems that the trials they are doing with vaccines for HER2 are limited to those who are +1 or +2 but not if you're +3. That seems odd and makes me think they don't have a great deal of confidence in the vaccines; either that or I just don't understand which is always possible. :-)

Re: HER2 and Immunotherapy Studies for reference
 

Some of the immunotherapies are targeting hormonally positive BC patients at risk for having their cancer mutate to HER2+. I read somewhere, and this isn't exclusively true, that having a low PR positivity increases the risk of the cell line shifting to ER+/HER2+.

I think we need to understand the difference between the different types of immunotherapies too. They target different cancerous mutations or alter immune system behavior. Some work better with no known disease burden, some low disease burden and some seem to work even for late stage disease. They are still learning so much and so many immunotherapy drugs are still in lengthy trials which seems tons less based upon how well they work but more based upon popularity of the concept within the medical community and business market sadly. We need greater access.

Re: HER2 and Immunotherapy Studies for reference
 

"
Results from a phase 1b "basket" (multidisease cohort) trial of pembrolizumab (Keytruda, Merck) for patients with advanced solid tumors expressing the programmed death 1 ligand (PD-L1) show that among 25 patients with estrogen receptor-positive (ER+), HER2-negative advanced breast cancer the overall response rate (ORR) was 12%, consisting entirely of three partial responses. An additional four patients (16%) had stable disease.
However, five (60%) patients had progressive disease, and three (22%) have not been assessed.
The investigators are not, however, discouraged.
"Based on these data, we believe that further investigation of immune therapies in HER-positive, ER-negative breast cancers, particularly using combination therapies that can expand the T-cell compartment, are warranted," said Hope Rugo, MD, director of the breast oncology clinical trials program at the University of California San Francisco."


Pembrolizumab Not So Hot (Yet) for Breast Cancer

http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/855888

Re: HER2 and Immunotherapy Studies for reference
 

This one is a little older so it is a little dated. What I liked about it is the explanation of active versus passive immunotherapy strategies and also understanding why melanoma is being pursued as a first target with anti PD-1 therapies now such as Opdivo and Keytruda.

Someone on Inspire.com is in a trial right now using passive t-cell immunotherapy, though using her own tumor infiltrating lymphocytes greatly expanded in number outside of her body and they re-administered after they flattened her immune system as they do with leukemia patients. It is working though, she was really sick before and tumors are shrinking and starting to go away. The study is being done in Bethesda.

Adoptive T cell therapy for cancer in the clinic

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1878537/

Re: HER2 and Immunotherapy Studies for reference
 

bump -- I should update it