{"id":2724,"date":"2019-03-11T21:34:34","date_gmt":"2019-03-11T21:34:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cmshub.wpengine.com\/?p=238233"},"modified":"2024-11-03T15:17:15","modified_gmt":"2024-11-03T15:17:15","slug":"fda-approves-first-immunotherapy-treatment-for-breast-cancer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/fda-approves-first-immunotherapy-treatment-for-breast-cancer\/","title":{"rendered":"FDA Approves First Immunotherapy Treatment For Breast Cancer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">The FDA has fast-tracked approval of a-first-of-its-kind immunotherapy treatment for breast cancer.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">This new treatment uses two different types of cancer therapy: Abraxane, a type of chemotherapy, and Tecentriq (generic name atezolizumab), a type of immunotherapy. Tecentriq has already been approved to treat certain kinds of urinary and lung cancers.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">The new treatment is specifically for triple negative breast cancer (TNBC), a notoriously aggressive form of the disease.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">TNBC<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.thebreastcancersite.greatergood.com\/tecentriq-immunotherapy\/\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"523\" class=\"size-full wp-image-238338 lazy\" data-src=\"https:\/\/d1dd4ethwnlwo2.cloudfront.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/slightly-smiling-cancer-patien.jpg\"\/><\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">Photo: Adobe Stock\/andreaobzerova<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">In TNBC, the cancerous cells don\u2019t have receptors for estrogen, progesterone, or the protein HER-2\/neu, all of which fuel cancer growth. This means doctors can\u2019t use hormone therapy in addition to other treatments to target the cancerous cells, leaving them with one less tool in their arsenal.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">Anywhere from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hopkinsmedicine.org\/breast_center\/breast_cancers_other_conditions\/triple_negative_breast_cancer.html\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">10% to 20%<\/a> of women diagnosed with breast cancer have TNBC. Women who are Hispanic or African-American, have the BRCA1 gene mutation, and\/or are diagnosed with breast under age 50 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2019\/03\/08\/health\/fda-approves-triple-negative-breast-cancer-immunotherapy\/index.html\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">are more likely<\/a> to have TNBC, and the survival rate for TNBC is lower than other breast cancers.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">This therapy regimen is used on TNBC that can\u2019t be removed with surgery and is either locally advanced or metastatic. The tumors must also have a protein called PD-L1 in order for the treatment to work properly. About <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC4000553\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">20%<\/a> of TNBC cancer have the protein.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">How it works<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.thebreastcancersite.greatergood.com\/tecentriq-immunotherapy\/\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"523\" class=\"size-full wp-image-238359 lazy\" data-src=\"https:\/\/d1dd4ethwnlwo2.cloudfront.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/patient-iv.jpg\"\/><\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">Photo: Adobe Stock\/peckyhyong<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">The immune system on its own typically views cancerous cells as part of the body, so it doesn\u2019t attack them. This therapy changes that.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">First, chemotherapy damages the cancer cells. Then, Tecentriq is administered, and this attaches to the cancer cells and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2019\/03\/08\/health\/fda-approves-triple-negative-breast-cancer-immunotherapy\/index.html\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">disables the PD-L1 protein<\/a>, which protects the cell from the immune system. Now that the immune system sees the cancer as an invader, it attacks.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">Chemo is given every week, while Tecentriq is given intravenously every other week.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">Accelerated Approval<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.thebreastcancersite.greatergood.com\/tecentriq-immunotherapy\/\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"523\" class=\"size-full wp-image-238339 lazy\" data-src=\"https:\/\/d1dd4ethwnlwo2.cloudfront.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/immunotherapy-cell.jpg\"\/><\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">Photo: Adobe Stock\/freshidea<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">A study published in October of 2018 in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nejm.org\/doi\/full\/10.1056\/NEJMoa1809615\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">The New England Journal Of Medicine<\/a> prompted the accelerated approval of this treatment. The study found that the therapy regimen lengthened the amount of time that a patient could survive without their cancer worsening. For some women, their survival was extended by 10 months, and the risk of cancer becoming metastatic dropped by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2018\/10\/20\/health\/immune-therapy-breast-cancer-advance\/index.html\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">up to 40%<\/a>.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">\u201cThis is the first time immunotherapy has worked in such a difficult-to-treat cancer, and is a huge step forward for these breast cancer patients,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2018\/10\/20\/health\/immune-therapy-breast-cancer-advance\/index.html\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">said<\/a> lead author of the study, Dr. Peter Schmid.<\/span><span itemprop=\"articleBody\">An \u201caccelerated approval\u201d by the FDA is contingent upon future successful trials. For this treatment, a final report on the drug\u2019s efficacy is due to the FDA by September of 2020. If the drug is considered beneficial, a traditional FDA approval will be given. If not, the drug could be pulled.<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/blog.thebreastcancersite.greatergood.com\/tecentriq-immunotherapy\/\">Source<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The FDA has fast-tracked approval of a-first-of-its-kind immunotherapy treatment for breast cancer.This new treatment uses two different types of cancer therapy: Abraxane, a type of chemotherapy, and Tecentriq (generic name atezolizumab), a type of immunotherapy. Tecentriq has already been approved to treat certain kinds of urinary and lung cancers.The new treatment is specifically for triple [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2725,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5137],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2724","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2724","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2724"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2724\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44557,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2724\/revisions\/44557"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}