StemCell Therapy

An experimental therapy for treating children and young adults with advanced leukemia could be the first gene therapy approved in the United States, potentially opening the door to a wave of treatments custom-made to target a patients cancer.

A panel of cancer experts that advises the federal Food and Drug Administration panel is holding a hearing Wednesday to discuss the treatment developed by the University of Pennsylvania and Novartis Corp.

The drugmaker is seeking approval to use the one-time treatment for children and young adults.

Called CAR-T, it involves removing immune cells from patients blood, genetically altering them in effect, reprogramming them to create an army of attack cells and then putting them back in the patients to fight these blood cancers.

The therapy could pave the way for other individualized, custom-made cancer treatments. Dr. Carl June, the Penn scientist who led the development of this immunotherapy, told the Washington Post it would be a true living drug.

The panel is reviewing the safety, effectiveness and production of the treatment. It will vote on whether to recommend FDA approval. The federal agency typically goes along with the recommendations of its advisory panels.

Excerpt from:
FDA cancer advisers consider what would be first gene therapy in US - Chicago Sun-Times

This entry was posted on July 12, 2017 at 5:03 pm and is filed under Gene therapy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed. |