New Cancer Drug Gives Hope To Many

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A small trial has given hope to cancer fighters, especially those with the deadly form of metastatic pancreatic cancer.

Researchers at St. George’s University in London have reported in the British Journal of Cancer, that IMM-101, an immunotherapy drug, has extended the lives of patients fighting metastatic pancreatic cancer. This form of pancreatic cancer is when the cancer progresses to other parts of the body. Death is usually fast when the diagnosis is made. Unlike chemotherapy, the drug also seems to have no side effects.

IMM-101 wakes up the immune system around the cancer cells that were shut off by the cancer. According to researchers, the drug could be promising in other cancer treatments as well.

Those who received a standard chemo drug in the trial generally survived 4.4 months, but those who received IMM-101 along side it, survived for seven months. Some even lived a year, and one lived for around three years. The case only helped those with metastatic pancreatic cancer, and not those whose disease didn’t spread.

The hospital’s Angus Dalgleish commented, “This is the first time we have got an immunotherapy that is a really good candidate to help control pancreatic cancer, which is one of the biggest killing diseases.”