These are the kinds of studies I’d like to see more of–new technologies to coax a patient’s own immune system to put up a fight against dangerous cancers.

According to the NCI’s Cancer Bulletin, scientists at Michigan’s Karmanos Cancer Institute have created a vaccine that in early studies has been 100% effective at preventing tumors in mice injected with HER2-positive breast cancer cells.

The researchers used breast cancer cells that mimic the HER2-positive tumors found in women, which account for 20 to 30 percent of breast cancer cases. Women with HER2-positive tumors can be treated with drugs that target the HER2 receptor, such as trastuzumab (Herceptin) and lapatinib, but in some women these drugs eventually stop working.

…After electrovaccination, the mice were injected with one of the four HER2 breast cancer lines. None of them developed tumors. However, control mice that had been electrovaccinated with a plasmid missing the HER2 DNA sequence developed tumors in every case. After 1 year of follow up, there were no adverse effects from vaccination.

While the researchers apparently hope to use the vaccine to protect patients whose disease has continued to progress after other treatment options have already been exhausted, I have to ask: why wouldn’t they want to use this type of less-toxic medicine as a first-line treatment?

SOURCE: NCI Cancer Bulletin for September 23, 2008 - National Cancer Institute.