Skin cancer vaccine closer to approval
Vaccine boosts five-year survival by 30%
AVAX Technologies in Kansas City, MO, will begin marketing M-VAX, an autologous cancer vaccine for Stage 3 metastatic melanoma, next year in Australia. The company recently announced that it is also expected to be available for commercial use soon in The Nether lands, Germany, and Japan.
M-VAX is the first of several autologous cell vaccines based on AVAX’s proprietary AC Vaccine technology. To date, more than 350 patients have been treated with M-VAX on an outpatient basis. The vaccine has shown promise as an adjuvant therapy in Stage 3 melanoma patients, with overall five-year survival of 55%, compared with a historical five-year survival rate of 22% with surgery alone.
M-VAX received orphan drug status early this year and is currently being evaluated in a multi-center registration trial in the United States.
The vaccine is made from a patient’s own cancer cells by modifying the tumor cells with a molecule called a "hapten." That process, which is known as "haptenization," alters the tumor cells and makes them appear foreign to the patient’s immune system. When the hapten-modified cells are reinjected into patients, they stimulate the immune system to recognize the cancer cells and destroy them.
AVAX also is testing vaccines for advanced ovarian cancer and post-surgical treatment of breast cancer.
(For more information, visit www. avax-tech. com.)
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