Periodicum biologorum, Vol. 114 No. 2, 2012.
Review article
Towards Systems Based Immunotherapy of Cancer* * Essay published in the Festschrift for Academician Drago Ikić on the occasion of his 95th birthday
STANIMIR VUK-PAVLOVIĆ
; College of Medicine, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN 55905, USA
Abstract
The essay, dedicated to Academician Drago Ikić–a pioneer in the development and preparation of vaccines for prevention of infectious diseases-at the occasion of his 95th birthday, discusses the relative failure of therapeutic vaccination for malignant diseases. From a personal perspective, the author recounts the historic examples of »spontaneous« tumor regressions in conjunction with acute infections; development of the first marketed purportedly antigen–specific cellular immunotherapy (for metastatic prostate cancer); the paradox of immunotherapy effect on overall survival, but not on time to disease progression; and the promise of the new complex systems–based approaches to a more rational design of cellular immunotherapy in the hope of bringing this mode of treatment into the therapeutic mainstream and standard of care.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
94072
URI
Publication date:
1.6.2012.
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