Study finds cancer
vaccine tests promising
A genetically engineered cancer vaccine, made with a potent immune system activating gene, GM-CSF, has shown promise in recent clinical trials. Researchers say that after further testing, the vaccine could prove useful in
Study finds cancer
vaccine tests promising
A genetically engineered cancer vaccine, made with a potent immune system activating gene, GM-CSF, has shown promise in recent clinical trials. Researchers say that after further testing, the vaccine could prove useful in treating a variety of solid tumors.
Study patients with advanced kidney cancer who received the vaccine showed activation of immune cells thought to be important in antitumor immunity. The trial vaccine produced measurable immune response in all 18 patients on the study, but only one patient experienced temporary remission.
Researchers, who said that much more research is necessary before the treatment becomes available, were pleased that the vaccine could produce an immune response and also be administered safely and with few side effects.
"The patients we treated had extremely advanced disease, so we didn't expect to cure anyone," said Fray Marshall, professor of urology and oncology at the School of Medicine and the study's lead author. "We believe these results demonstrate that the vaccine has clinical potential."
The findings were published in the April 15 issue of Cancer Research.
Needle exchange program does not increase litter
Researchers say a program that exchanged 25,000 needles used by injection drug users did not significantly increase the number of needles discarded on the streets of Baltimore, probably because 97.2 percent of the needle users returned their used needles to the program.
"We knew that giving clean needles was the best way to limit the risk of spreading bloodborne diseases such as HIV and hepatitis B and C," said David Vlahov, professor of epidemiology at the School of Public Health and lead author of a study that appeared in the April 15 issue of the American Journal of Epidemiology. "[But] we wanted to make sure that in helping limit disease, we were not creating another problem."
The program gave enrollees two starter needles. Each time a used needle was turned in, a clean needle was given out in return. According to Vlahov, once before, and one and two months after, a mobile van began dispensing needles four days a week, teams of surveyors counted vials, needles and bottles lying in the streets in a 32-block area around the exchange site. Two months after the program started, surveyors found no significant increase in the numb