Patient Power

Patient Power, the excellent cancer patient advocate organization, has an ASH follow-up that focuses on RadioImmunoTherapy.

 The video features Dr. Ajay Gopal of the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, who oversaw a study that used RadioImmunoTherapy as a conditioning agent for transplants. In other words, a bone marrow or stem cell transplant needs some treatment to wipe out cancer cells before healthy cells are reintroduced into the patient's body. This study used a combination of chemotherapy (which is traditional) and RIT (which is not) to condition.

The trial involved 107 patients, and had side effects comparable to previous regiments. But the results were an improvement -- 2 years after transplant, almost 80% of patients had survived.

The results are very preliminary, but, as Dr. Gopal describes, are very encouraging for a number of reasons.

The video is available at Patient Power.