Pancreatic Cancer Vaccine Progress Reported

(CBS)  Pancreatic cancer kills three-quarters of the people diagnosed with it within a year, and 95 percent within five years.

But now, reports CBS News Medical Correspondent Dr. Jennifer Ashton, a clinical trial at Johns Hopkins Medical Center is testing a new approach: teaching a patient's immune system to recognize and fight the cancer.

"What you're essentially trying to do," explains Dr. Dan Laheru, "is have the immune system recognize pancreatic cancer as being foreign."

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He says the vaccine, which is kept in a subzero freezer, is made from pancreatic cancer tumors that have been radiated so they're harmless. The cells of the vaccine are then genetically engineered so the immune system sees them as an enemy and attacks the cancer.

"The idea," Laheru continued, "is that, once the immune system now recognizes cancer cells as being foreign, they have potentially the ability to recognize cancer at any time point and kill them before they have the chance to spread."

He stresses that the trial is in its early stages, and much more work needs to be done. But there's hope that, in time, the vaccine will become an effective tool in the treatment of pancreatic cancer.

The trial only accepts patients who first had pancreatic cancer surgery. Sometimes, the disease is so advanced when it's diagnosed, surgery isn't possible.

Similar vaccines that attempt to utilize the immune system to fight cancer are being worked on to battle other cancers: colon, prostate, breast, and melanoma.

Ashton spoke with Ron Windle. The vaccine appears to have stopped pancreatic cancer in its tracks in him. He says he'd tell others diagnosed with it, "It's not a death sentence. And, if they've been told it's a death sentence, get a second opinion. There is hope out there!"

Ashton says the immune system sometimes doesn't see cancers as foreign because, "Cancers are often clandestine. Pancreatic cancer, specifically, is described by some doctors as a stealth disease: It's good and tricking the body into not knowing it's there."

She also says it's better to have the body's own immune system take it on than chemotherapy and radiation because the other methods can negatively affect other parts of the body, not just the cancer. Doctors like the idea of immunotherapy because they feel the immune system will be better able to target just the cancer.

[knwindle]

Nimsegal,
As the daughter of Ron Windle, I respectfully disagree with your entire commentary.

There are advances being made, and research and numerous studies being done by wonderful doctors. This particular vaccine study has saved my dad's life - and I am convinced of that, regardless of the fact that my father went through chemo, radiation and surgery.

The "new info" from the Hopkins vaccine study is that it's working - for my father and others. It is by no means a cure for Pancreatic Cancer, but the hope is that we're doing something about this terrible disease. My father and his doctors at Hopkins are fighting this so called death sentence.

The purpose of this segment was to provide hope - to those who may encounter this disease in the future and to those who are undergoing this traumatic ordeal right now. Seven years ago we were planning my father's funeral, nine months from tomorrow, he will be walking me down the aisle.

Be thankful that people like my father are willing to undergo experimental studies and please contact Hopkins directly with questions about his particular study. Thank you to the CBS Early Show for the uplifting segment, and showing the world that people do survive.

Sincerely,
Kristen Windle

[Nimsegal]

This was a terrible report, as it gave the impression of a breakthrough in treating pancreatic cancer, and actually reported no news, and offer no substantiation for the impression it gave:

1. The vaccine research reported on at Johns Hopkins is over ten years old. There was nothing said about it that could not have been said five years ago or even ten years ago. No information was provided about the results of their clinical trials, some of which have been concluded. In short, there was no news.

2. The report focused on one individual, diagnosed in 2003. So far he has no recurrence. However, he had, prior to the vaccine treatment, an operation and follow up chemo and radiation. Most pancreatic patients do not have an operation. For people with his treatment, long term survival without the vaccine is about 20%. Neither the patient nor his doctors know whether he is just one of those 20% or whether the vaccine actually was beneficial in his case, What would have been interesting would be to learn what percentage of the people in his trial are still alive, an easy statistic to obtain, but not pursued in the report.

3, In short this was a shamefully empty and misleading piece of reporting about a terrible disease.