Search Here

According to the results from two international trials, two new types of treatments for the deadliest form of skin cancer, advanced melanoma were very successful. The experimental drugs, pembrolizumab and nivolumab were capable of enabling the body's own immune system to identify and kill these tumors.

In the first trial that involved 411 participants, researchers tested the effects of pembrolizumab. They found that 69 percent of the patients who took the drug survived at least one year. In one of the patients, 64-year-old Warwick Steele, the drug was capable of clearing the cancer that had spread to his lungs. Prior to the treatment, Steele had difficulty walking or performing other tasks because the cancer in his lungs made it difficult for him to breathe. Now, he can garden and even shop. Steele started pembrolizumab infusions every three weeks back in October. Some side effects included night sweats and brief black outs.

"Pembrolizumab looks like it has potential to be a paradigm shift for cancer therapy," Dr. David Chao, consultant oncologist at the Royal Free London NHS (National Health Service) Foundation Trust.

"I got tired simply standing up and was literally too exhausted to shave. But now I feel back to normal and can do gardening and go shopping," Steele said.

In the other trial of 53 patients, researchers tested the effects of adding nivolumab to immunotherapy, ipilimumab. The researchers found that the survival rates after one and two years were 85 percent and 79 percent respectively.

"I am convinced that this is a breakthrough in treating melanoma," John Wagstaff, Professor of medical oncology at Swansea College of Medicine, who is part of a larger trial of these two drugs, said according to BBC News. "The trial is still "blinded" so we don't know what treatments the patients are getting, but we have seen some spectacular responses."

Despite the promising and exciting results from both studies, health experts cautioned that both trials are Phase 1, early stage trials. The larger Phase III trials are underway and could yield different results.

Both of the studies' findings were presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) conference in Chicago, IL.