Prostate Cancer Vaccine Shows Promise

[Angel]

A new vaccine designed to battle an especially serious form of prostate cancer has shown promising results in early clinical trials.

Researchers conducting a phase III study in 127 men with asymptomatic metastatic hormone refractory prostate cancer, or HRPC, found men who received the active vaccine lived, on average, about four months longer than those who received a placebo. At the 36-month follow up, 34 percent of the vaccine group was still alive, compared to just 11 percent of the placebo group.

The vaccine, which is expected to go on the market in the next year, works by stimulating T-cell immunity to an antigen found in prostate cancer cells.

"This trial is an important milestone in the development of new treatments for prostate cancer patients," says study author Eric J. Small, M.D., from the University of California, San Francisco. "The potential survival benefit that was observed may offer important benefits to patients and would represent the first time that immunotherapy has provided a survival advantage in prostate cancer."

Prostate cancer is the third-leading cause of cancer death in men. In most cases, the disease can be effectively treated with surgery, radiation and hormone therapy, but men whose cancer spreads become harder to treat. Nearly all eventually develop HRPC, and virtually all prostate cancer deaths are in men with this form of the disease.