prostate-report.org

Prostate cancer vaccines found to be more effective with hormone therapy

 According to recent data published in the July 15 Clinical Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research, among patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer, the addition of hormone therapy following vaccine treatment improved overall survival compared with either treatment alone or when the vaccine followed hormone treatment.

Philip M. Arlen, M.D., director of the Clinical Research Group for the Laboratory of Tumor Immunology and Biology, Center for Cancer Research, at the National Cancer Institute, said the findings have important implications for guiding treatment decisions for prostate cancer patients.

The study leader said that vaccines, if and when they are approved, can be safely and effectively combined with other therapies, including hormones. There appears to be an advantage in overall survival and the hormone therapy in combination with the vaccine works in two ways:

1. by using hormone therapy in prostate cancer patients can help enhance the T-cell response to where the cancer is in the prostate gland,
2. patients are also more likely to achieve a better immune response.