Trial vaccine targets triple-negative breast cancer, considered deadliest form of the disease
Triple-negative breast cancer is considered the deadliest form of this disease.
LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Triple-negative breast cancer continues to be the most difficult-to-treat form of breast cancer. About 10 to 15% of patients with breast cancer have this aggressive type, but a new vaccine could someday change the way it's treated.
Abby Perez was just 37 when she was diagnosed with a highly aggressive form of breast cancer. She remembers the hair loss, the weight loss, nausea and fatigue.
Twenty years ago, she says her treatment was difficult to tolerate. At the time, Perez's son Noah was just 3 years old.
"I think the reason I am alive is because of him, because I probably would have thrown in the towel," Perez said.
Triple-negative breast cancer is considered the deadliest and most aggressive form of this disease. It grows quickly, doesn't respond to conventional treatments and has a higher likelihood of spreading.
It disproportionately affects women under 50. But now, Cleveland Clinic researchers have developed a new weapon -- a vaccine that helps the body recognize tumor cells and eliminate them.
"74%, so about three quarters of these patients, developed an immune response, which we defined ahead of time. So, we have identified a dose and the fact that it produces an immune response," said Dr. Thomas Budd with the Cleveland Clinic.
Study participants received a total of three vaccinations once every two weeks.
Besides the promising results, Budd said they learned the vaccine is well tolerated. Side effects mainly consisted of mild irritation at the injection site.
"The phase two trials will be the first look at - does it do what we want it to do? Does it reduce the risk of the cancer coming back in patients who have breast cancer?" he said.
Today, Perez's son is on his way to law school. She's grateful she's here to be a part of it and grateful new treatments will be improving the way this devastating cancer is treated.
"What I went through I don't think anybody should have gone through," she said.
The second phase of this trial is expected to begin later this year. The goal is for the vaccine to be used in patients with early forms of triple-negative breast cancer, and hopefully someday it can be used to prevent this type of disease altogether.
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