A new study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, found that a new, experimental treatment, provided staggering remission rates for advanced leukemia patients.  The study included 30 participants, including adults and children, that all received the experimental therapy.  With this therapy, 90 percent of patients achieved full remission, with sustained remission in 67 percent.

The therapy uses autologous T cells transduced with a CD19-directed chimeric antigen receptor.  In simpler terms, The Columbus Dispatch explains that the experimental treatment involves genetically programming cells from the patient’s own immune system to fight the disease.  For these patients, this treatment was a last resort and their last hope.  Their medical history involved being in and out of remission, more than half had undergone failed stem cell transplants, and most were given only weeks or months to live.

Medical Daily describes the experimental treatment as “genetically engineered ‘hunter’ cells that tracked and systematically destroyed tumor cells.”  Despite being up against aggressive forms of cancer, the therapy has had an unprecedented level of success.  The current study is just the first of what is likely to be many to come.

The current study was conducted by researchers at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.  Similar research, with similarly optimistic results, is being done at other facilities around the U.S., including the National Cancer Institute and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

Each year in the U.S., acute lymphoblastic leukemia affects about 2,400 people older than 20 and 3,600 younger than 20. It has a cure rate in adults of about 40 percent, compared with 80 to 90 percent in children. About 1,170 adults die of the disease each year, compared with 270 people younger than age 20.  This new therapy offers hope to the thousands with little hope of survival and recovery.