Immunotherapy

Your body has a natural tendency to fight against bacteria and viruses. It’s called your immune system. Recently physicians have learned that the immune system also goes to battle to protect against cancers and to combat cancers that have already developed, including mesothelioma.

Immunotherapy is the name given to treatments that are designed to assist and enhance the body’s own efforts to protect us from many diseases and to help us heal. Scientists feel it is a promising new weapon against cancers, but it is still very early in development. Early studies indicate that the immune system can slow down the growth and spread of cancer cells.

The immune system may be able to improve results with traditional treatments such as surgery, radiation and chemotherapy.

Your immune system may play a role when you develop cancer when it fails to recognize cancer cells as foreign. Even if it does, it may not be strong enough to destroy the cancer. Also cancer cells themselves can slow down or disable the immune system.

To overcome this, researchers have designed ways to help the immune system recognize cancer cells and strengthen its response so that it will destroy the cancer.
Active immunotherapy energizes the body's own immune system to fight disease. Passive immunotherapy manufactures in the lab some of the same substances (e.g., antibodies) that the immune system uses.

Immunotherapy definition
The definition of immunotherapy is any treatment that stimulates or restores the immune system’s ability to fight infection and disease. Also known as biologic or biological therapy, immunotherapy uses the body's natural abilities (the immune system) to ward off foreign or invasive substances such as bacteria and viruses. It can also help lessen some of the side effects of other treatments.

Immunotherapy works with substances labeled biological response modifiers (BRMs). Your body produces low levels of BRMs when you have any infection or disease. Now researchers are making BRMs in laboratories and using them in large quantities to treat cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, and other diseases.

Immunotherapy cancer treatment
Research in immunotherapy cancer treatment is focusing on developing new and better ways to tap into and strengthen the body's natural tendency to defend itself against malignant tumors. Immunotherapy that uses certain substances like cytokines is now recommended for most cancer treatment regimens. Other types are being experimented with as anticancer agents. New treatments that use cytokines like interferon, or use monoclonal antibodies, or use vaccine-type approaches are now the subject of much research in immunology.

Search our Centers of Excellence section to find specialized mesothelioma doctors who can give you information about how immunotherapy might be of help to you.

Help with mesothelioma lawsuit
If you are living with mesothelioma—whether you live in California, Texas, or Ohio, or even in Canada, or Mexico—the mesothelioma attorneys at HendlerLaw are experts at determining your legal rights for seeking compensation for wrongful asbestos exposure.

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