B1 – Intermediate
Because of a new experimental gene therapy, cancer patients might have a fighting chance against the deadly disease cancer.
Gene therapy is a medical approach to treat or cure a person from a disease by modifying their genes. The process involves replacing defective genes with healthy ones.
For more than ten years of his life Nick Wilkins fought leukemia. It was a heartbreaking time for his parents. But now at 15, Nick is cancer-free thanks to a new experimental therapy.
Nick went through many kinds of treatment: chemotherapy, radiation therapy and a bone marrow transplant, but the cancer kept coming back. Nothing was working. But then his parents found out about a clinical trial for an experimental gene therapy at the University of Pennsylvania.
It’s called “personalized cell therapy.” Doctors reprogram the patient’s T-cells to multiply and then attack and destroy cancer cells. The T-cells attack the cancer cells like the body fights a cold.
Trials started in 2010 and the results have been very positive. Most of the children in the trials have gone into complete remission. And one third of adults have gone into remission, as well.
There are plans to expand the trials to other hospitals. If all goes well the treatment could become available to the public in three to five years.
Discussion Questions:
- What was your reaction to the success of this approach with Nick Wilkins?
- What are your thoughts on gene therapy or personalized cell therapy?
- What are the good and bad things about joining a clinical trial for an experimental drug or treatment?
- If you were Nick Wilkins’ parents, would you do the same with your child who is suffering from a terminal illness? Why or why not?
- Why do you think it is so hard to find an ultimate cure for cancer?
8 replies on “Great Results for a New Type of Gene Therapy”
1. My first reaction was surprise and happiness. Currently, my work is related to Clinical Trials, so I feel really happy when I read good news as this one!
2. In general, science is unpredictable. It’s difficult to know about the future of Medicine, but if the results are good, the way should be good as well.
3. The main advantage of Clinical Trials is that you can take profits of a new drug, with last medical technology. The other size is that not always these drugs work. Also, sometimes appear new adverse reactions, unknown yet.
4. This is a complicated and personal decision, and everyone should think long about it. In my opinion, I would try to do absolutely everything for my children, even test a new drug.
5. Cancer is not only one disease, it is a multiple kind of diseases involving several parts of the human body. The mechanism of action could be similar for these pathologies, but never exactly the same. In addition, tumoral cells are hidden between “normal” cells, and it is hard to identify them by oncology treatments.
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1. I am really glad that all the work and dedication from the scientists is paying off as visible results can be seen from patients undergoing these kind of therapies.
2. Choosing the right treatment can be quite complicated as different people respond in a different way to the same treatment. Nevertheless, any new revolutional therapies, whether they are personalized cell therapies or pills, are welcome as long as they have achieved good results during clinical trials and they are deemed to be effective.
3. Cancer is undoubtedly one of the worst diseases one can ever be diagnosed with. One of the advantages of joining a clinical trial is that the new treatment might work well and the disease can remit. On the other hand, the disadvantages are that you have to follow strict protocol restrictions to be part of the clinical trial.
4. Asolutely! I would enourage my son to take part in the clinical trials. I believe that at that stage when many kinds of treatment did not work for him, there is nothing to lose. In addition, his participation will contribute in the cancer reseach which might improve people’s quality of life in the future.
5. Cancer is not an easy disease to treat. Needless to say, each individual might present a different set of mutations for the same type of cancer.
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1. I work on this, so it hasn’t been a surprise. Nevertheless, it’s always a joy to listen individual cases of success of such an innovative and complex therapy.
2. We can be very proud of finally achieve results of a so much long work. We’ve been working (and dreaming) on gene therapy since 3-4 decades!
On the other hand, we must be cautious in the right and ethics applications.
3. It has more good things than bad ones. It will depend on the type and phase of the clinical development of the drug/treatment, but in general, among good things are: you may have a better therapy for your disease, you will be more and better controlled than a usual patient, and finally you will help on the science and thus in the future wellbeing of other people. The only bad thing could be that there is a higher risk than another approved (and thus, well-known) drug of suffering side effects, but there are many people working in the companies that own the drug and health care providers taking care that the risk is as minimum as possible.
4. Yes, If I were Nick Wilkins’ father, I would do the same. When the illness of your son can kill him, any purpose of solution is welcome.
5. Cancer is so difficult to cure because it is not a simple disease, it is very complex. And cancer is not one disease, every cancer is different from the others, i.e. gastric cancer is different from brain cancer and the same therapies are not effective. Besides, there are many factors that cause the damage by which the tumour is growing and spreading (different mutated gens, failure in methabolism, resistance to drugs, environment factors, etc)
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1. My reaction is very good. I am very happy to see those results. I am a clinical researcher and have been working in the area of oncology and oncohematology for many years. Much progress is being made in new therapies and it is gratifying to see that there are visible results.
2. My thoughts on gene therapy or personalized cell therapy are good. Genetic therapies promise to treat many diseases, but they are still new approaches to treatment and may have risks. Potential risks could include reactions, allergic and other adverse events in the future.
3. You can receive a treatment that has been approved in other country and not available in your country. The new treatment may work better than the standard treatment (no one knows this for sure, which is why the trial is being done) you could help to improve cancer treatment for patients in the future. you may have more blood tests, scans or other cancer tests.
4. Yes, in this case I will do the same. After review the situation with the medical team, if they think this is the best option I will start with the treatment.
5. Every cancer is caused by a different set of mutations and as the tumor grows, more and more mutations accumulate. This means that every tumor has an individual set of mutations, so a drug that works for one cancer patient, might have absolutely no effect on another.
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