Cancer Vaccine Works Through Immune System

In her 49 years, Elaine Silk has learned, among other things, to drive a tractor, weld steel, sail a boat, grow vegetables organically and build a successful sales career. She also has learned that fear is worse than pain and that the word "family" doesn't necessarily imply "next of kin."

These days she is learning, with the help of her body's immune system, to fight melanoma, the most dangerous form of skin cancer.

Silk is participating in an M. D. Anderson clinical research study involving a vaccine she hopes will prevent her cancer from recurring a second time.

Silk's cancer, which was originally diagnosed and treated in 2003, returned in August 2005. After Silk had surgery and radiation treatments for the recurrence, doctors recommended interferon therapy to help prevent a second recurrence. But Silk sought an alternative she hoped would have fewer side effects. That led her to the vaccine study at M. D. Anderson.

The former Houstonian who moved to Calgary with her husband less than a year ago now commutes to Houston every three weeks for injections she says produce few side effects - "just a little soreness."

Silk is the seventh patient to enroll in the clinical study, which opened in November 2005. Researchers hope to enroll 100 people in the study that lasts a year for each patient. The study represents one of many contributions being made at M. D. Anderson and around the world in the growing field of cancer immunology.

Treatment works like any other vaccine

Immunology involves adjusting the immune system in an attempt to protect the human body against cancer in the same way it guards against disease-causing viruses and bacteria.

Researchers are hopeful the vaccine will work for Silk in much the same way as the measles vaccine she had as a child. "Basically, they give you synthetic melanoma cells so that the immune system will kick in," she says.

The vaccine contains the antigen glycoprotein (gp100) and MAGE-3 peptides (proteins), which are used to rev up the immune system. This helps it more effectively seek the target antigen in melanoma cells, says the study's principal investigator Patrick Hwu, M.D., chair of M. D. Anderson's Department of Melanoma Medical Oncology.

Vaccines will be part of tomorrow's cancer care

Immunologists believe the vaccine may represent the future of immunologic cancer treatment. Reaching this point has taken years of effort at research centers throughout the world. M. D. Anderson opened a state-of-the-art research building in 2003 to house its Center for Cancer Immunology Research, and hired top experts in the fields of immunology and oncology, says Yong-Jun Liu, M.D., Ph.D., chair of M. D. Anderson's Department of Immunology and an internationally known cancer immunologist.

"The goal of the center is to accelerate the pace of basic science discoveries in immunology to use the findings and concepts as quickly as possible in treating patients," Liu says.

Silk is certainly grateful the vaccine study opened in time for her to benefit from the treatment. It has given her a choice in therapies that she hopes will lead to a positive outcome. "You just don't know how wonderful that is," Silk says. "I am so excited about the trial."