Melanoma is the deadliest form of skin cancer.
Results of an international trial show that a combination of drugs could help extend the lives of patients suffering melanoma – the most dangerous form of skin cancer.
During the trial, 945 people suffering from melanoma were treated with both ipilimumab and nivolumab. In 58% of the cases, this combination therapy resulted in a decrease of the advancement of the cancer, i.e. the tumours stayed the same size or shrank in size over a year period.
How does it work?
Our immune system protects our body from harmful infections by attacking foreign cells. However, our system is clever and turns on its inherent “brake” function in order to avoid attacking the body’s own tissues. Cancer cells mutate and damage healthy tissue and are not recognised by our immune system as a threat. This means that cancer continues to attack our body’s cells, undetected by our immune system.
A new drug combination may be able to tackle this problem. Dr Alan Worsley, Cancer Research UK’s senior science information officer, explains that the combination of ipilimumab and nivolumab “release the brakes on the immune system while blocking cancer’s ability to hide from it.” This way the drugs are “a powerful one-two punch” against advanced melanoma”.
Side effects
At the moment, researchers can not access the effectiveness of these drugs based on early treatment responses alone. The side effects, including fatigue, rashes and diarrhoea, experienced by more than half of the tested patients, will also need to be taken into account. Interestingly, the side effects were only experienced by a quarter of the patients when treated with ipilimumab alone.
Unfortunately responses were not consistent across all tested patients; some responded exceptionally well to treatment, while others felt no benefits at all. Identifying those who are most likely to benefit from this treatment is the key factor in the process of combating the disease.
Slow progress
Drug combination therapy is now being intensely researched to see whether there is a similar response for other types of cancer. Hope remains amongst researchers that further drug combinations could be just as effective.
However, there is still a long way to go and some experts caution against expectations of “miraculous breakthroughs”.
Eminent oncologist Prof Karol Sikora, the dean of the University of Buckingham’s medical school, says “The prolongation of survival from these very expensive immune therapies is often a matter of weeks or months and we’ve got to make it long-lasting and that has to be our priority. She adds: “There are breakthroughs coming, there is hope for cancer, that we will do much better in the future. It’s slow progress, rather than miraculous breakthroughs, as it’s likely to be reported.”