Experimental treatment for myeloma cancer shows promise

Israeli researchers at Hadassah University Medical Center found a 90 percent success rate for treating multiple myeloma cancer, Prof. Polina Stepensky told The Jerusalem Post. The second most common blood or hematological disease, multiple myeloma cancer often works into a person’s bone marrow, the spongy tissue at the center that produces the body’s blood cells. 

How does it work? The university uses genetic engineering technology called chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy, or CAR-T, to boost the patient’s immune system to destroy the cancer. CAR-T will now make the diagnosis much easier and treatment possible. The therapy was developed after a series of experiments by Hadassah University’s bone marrow transplant and immunotherapy department. Of the two hundred patients on the waiting list worldwide, only one per week can enter treatment, which is still being conducted as an experiment.

Dig Deeper: Read Heather Frank’s report in WORLD Magazine about anti-cancer microbes.