Rare Leukemia Targeted by Modifying Patients’ Immune Cells

Newswise — Young patients with a particular type of leukemia who have relapsed after going into remission may find new hope through a treatment that involves modifying a patient’s own T cells, an important part of the immune system, to destroy cancer cells.

While the therapy, in which genes are inserted into a patient’s T cells, is expected to receive Food and Drug Administration approval soon for pediatric patients, researchers hope that it will be effective for adult patients as well and for more types of cancers, according to Dr. Steven Gore, director of hematologic malignancies at the Yale Cancer Center.

Read the full article from the New Haven Register at http://www.nhregister.com/news/article/Rare-leukemia-targeted-by-modifying-patients-11738088.php