Scientists in the U.K. have discovered a new cancer treatment that could eliminate head and neck tumors in terminally ill patients.
“These are promising results,” said Professor Kristian Helin, the chief executive for the Institute of Cancer Research in London, which performed a clinical trial on nearly 1,000 patients, using a cocktail of immunotherapy medications to treat their tumors.
The treatment reoriented patients’ immune systems to attack their own cancer cells, promoting what researchers called “a positive trend in survival,” The Guardian reported.
One of the trial patients was expected to pass away some four years ago. Now, though, he is feeling great. Weeks after joining the study, nurses called to tell him his tumor had “completely disappeared.” A grandfather and husband, 77-year-old Barry Ambrose is now cancer-free and just returned from a cruise with his wife.
“When the research nurses called me to tell me that, after two months, the tumor in my throat had completely disappeared, it was an amazing moment,” he recalled. “While there was still disease in my lungs at that point, the effect was staggering.”
Ambrose later underwent chemotherapy and surgery.
Researchers found a combination of the monoclonal antibodies nivolumab and ipilimumab significantly reduce the size of tumors. For some, the cancer disappears entirely. In addition to yielding good results, experts see the immunotherapy treatment as an appealing alternative with fewer side effects than “extreme” forms of chemotherapy.
“Immunotherapies are kinder, smarter treatments that can bring significant benefits to patients,” explained Helin.
For his part, Ambrose has nothing but good things to say about the researchers and nurses at Royal Marsden Hospital in London. He told The Guardian he is “so fortunate” for the incredible treatment he’s received and described the scientists there as “the gift that keeps on giving.”
While this is very new data that needs further investigation, Kevin Harrington, a professor of biological cancer therapies at the ICR and a consulting clinical oncologist for Royal Marsden Hospital, said the findings are “clinically meaningful.”
“We will need to do longer follow-up to see whether we can demonstrate a survival benefit across all patients in the trial,” he said.
***As the number of voices facing big-tech censorship continues to grow, please sign up for Faithwire’s daily newsletter and download the CBN News app, developed by our parent company, to stay up-to-date with the latest news from a distinctly Christian perspective.***