|  |  |  | | | | Personalised treatment for blood cancers is a step closer | | | | |
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Release Date: 15 April 09
The UK is at the forefront of personalised care for blood cancers thanks to sustained funding by Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research.
From 15-16 April, at the charity’s Strategic Review at the Royal Society of Medicine, London, world experts are coming together to help the charity ensure the long-awaited era of personalised genetic treatment is a reality for patients with leukaemia, lymphoma and myeloma within ten years.
Professor John Sweetman, Chairman of the Clinical Trials Panel for Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research, said: “Treating patients with toxic chemotherapy drugs is the cancer doctor's stock in trade. However this is a very crude, blunderbuss approach to treatment. While most of the cancer cells will be killed by the drugs this is at the expense of extensive "collateral damage" to healthy cells as well. Furthermore there is no guarantee that individual patients will be cured of their disease because any remaining cancer cells will cause relapse and death.”
Blood cancers are a broad spectrum of many sub-types based on the genetic abnormalities present in the malignant cells. These sub-types have an equally broad set of responses to chemotherapy drugs.
Professor Sweetman explains: “The "one size fits all" approach to treatment for patients with a blood cancer is no longer appropriate or justified. Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research is working to tailor future treatment to each patient, based on the precise diagnosis of the disease sub-type.”
The charity has been focused on improving outcomes for patients since its inception nearly 50 years ago. Then leukaemia, lymphoma and myeloma were a virtual death sentence and treatments were very crude. Now, thanks to sustained investment, research into personalised treatments is gathering pace, with recent breakthroughs already leading to lifesaving drugs for previously untreatable cancers.
Diagnosis of blood cancers is based on the tiny genetic abnormalities in patients that cause the different cancers. Doctors are now able to base treatments for some forms of blood cancer on individual genetic fingerprints. The ‘Minimal Residual Disease’ test developed with £3 million funding from Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research, is used to measure the responses of children with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia to their initial treatment and to determine how much more chemotherapy they need. This test is now a standard part of NHS treatment.
Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research scientists across the country have discovered how certain genetic markers in patients can determine whether they have a good or a poor prognosis for a number of blood cancers. Genetic databases set by Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research are used to assess risk for patients with acute forms of leukaemia. Gene therapy is based on artificially boosting the immune system to attack the cancer to cure and to protect in the future. DNA vaccines are now being trialled in a clinical setting and studies to assess the effectiveness of gene therapy to boost T cells of the immune system will start this summer.
Dr Shabih Syed, Scientific Director at Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research, says: “Personalised medicine for patients with blood cancers is now a very real prospect. Already tailored treatments which have been developed with funding by Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research are finding their way on to the wards and helping us to save the lives of more and more patients with leukaemia, lymphoma and myeloma.”
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