Immunotherapy: The Battle Within | Documentary
(Loose transcripts)
German refugee Fred Stein
Infection --> remission
Dr. Kiran Lentz, MD - International Immunology Foundation, Prien, Germany
Ralf Keleef, MD
Int Immune Oncology
Ferre Akbarpour, MD
Chief Medical Director, Orange County Immune Institute
From the Blacklist to the Nobel Prize
By Ralph Moss and the Center for Integrative Oncology present:
Science Writer since 1974
MSKCC lied about it
Fired the next day after holding a press conference about it
Also very interested in the conventional
There are only effective and ineffective treatments
The great untold story is William B. Coley
Biggest cover up is the effectiveness of Coley's toxins. The closest we've ever gotten to curing cancer
Hundreds were cured in the early 1900s.
Rise of radiation and then chemo;
CT incredibly inexpensive
In 1963 against vehement
FDA refused to grandfather in CT
Went against their own rules and didn't allow it
THE ACS put it on its list of unproven
The most damning thing that could happen
Eveything conspired against it
Working actively behind the scenes to prevent any further research
Helen and Lloyd J Old - joined at the hip
Helen had no formal training but Lloyd Old was one of the most eminent immunologists of his day
He was the Senior VP at MSKCC 1973-1986
Dr. Lentz
Detected TNC-alpha - uses every day
Successor of Dr. Old is James P. Allison, PhD, 2018 Nobel Prize winner
In 1960s became aware of Lloyd's work and T cells and the T cell receptor. Decided he wanted to unravel T cells.
Do you want to know where we get all our new ideas from? ACS book Unproven Methods of Cancer Management - this is the "Bible"
Helen had no official position but founded the Cancer Research Institute
Fund 150 post doc trainings yearly - Kleef was one of them
Scientifically
Honorary doctorate from Rockefeller University - mostly helens' effort - 20 monographs on her dad's work
Successes were extraordinary
Case after case with ppl of dire disease who survived 30, 40, 50 years
Lloyd despaired of opposing the establishment
Let's go to the root
Can't prove in RCTs
Coley died the year before the RCT was invented
Lloyd directed 200mill toward research cancer immunotherapy and recruited 1000 researchers into the field
Ralf Kleef = Certificate from MSKCC for Resarch fellow in the lab of Dr. Dana Bovberg - 9/12/94
Felt he was back to his roots
James Allison - immune surveillance
The IS has antitumor effects
One of the greatest immunologists in the world
How the IS relates to the IS
Immune checkpoint inhibitors - Yervoy (ipi), Opdivo (nivolumab), Keytruda (pembrolizumab) have revolutionized the way cancer is treated today
T cells are being controlled by checkpoint inhibitors
Blocking the blocking
22 yo woman - brain, liver lung mets. Hospice when she got ipi - tumors went away (14 y ago)
Dr. Said she should think about not having babies
Had melanoma - had her life. Had 2 kids
10 and 7 y.o.
Phase 1 trial from 2001 woman - single dose and is still alive
19 years out no more treatments
Biopsy - never shows cancer - scar tissue where the fight was going on
High dose xrt and chemo suppress IS but studies show that chemo doesn't work all that well in animals that don't have immune systems
There is an immune component to chemo
Ferre Akbarpour, MD
Mark Rosenberg, MD Medical Director, Advanced Medical Therapeutics
Awakened the health care industry to immunotherapy for cancer
Keytruda - Carter's melanoma
Rosen - uses CPI in low doses in combo with other techniques - complete remission
Sometimes no effect, the right, or overwhelming - hard to predict
Some died in early trials - no adverse effects in mice except vitiligo - no wt loss
Then gave 10, 100x as high. No adverse events whatsoever then bam in humans
Kept mice as clean as they can keep them
Humans - lots of infections
Developed algorithms
Almost no colitis now - that was what killed people early on.
Correlation now between AE and response - more likely to have good outcome when you have adverse events