Dear Owl
Good morning! Yes - I have emailed the HealthMatch people to apologise and explain, with a request that they delete my bogus enquiry. I'm not sure if either my initial enquiry or my reply email have reached an actual human being yet, but hopefully that will happen.
The ASX200 news is welcome and fun, but I know we both feel that the real issue here has always been the possibility that Imugene can reduce the burden of pain, suffering and grief caused by cancer. In that respect the HealthMatch advertisement featuring Michele's story is quite compelling.
Her previous Immune therapy will have been Keytruda or Tecentriq, because we are told that it was "meant to help improve her immune system's ability to identify and target cancer cells." That means a PD-1 or PD-L1 Inhibitor, and previous failure on that kind of treatment is one of the inclusion criteria for the PD1-vaxx trial. One of the common failings with the current T-cell MAbs such as Keytruda is the tendency for their effect to reduce over time, which clearly happened with Michele: "Despite more than two years of immunotherapy treatments, her cancer came back and was spreading into her adrenal glands, lymph nodes, brain, and chest."
Not surprising her Dr told her it was "incurable." That is just a terrible diagnosis to have.
Another anti-cancer drug failed because of side effects when combined with her Chemo.
Then along comes the PD1-vaxx trial and a year later "her cancer stabilized and her health has improved — all with no side effects." That's simply an astonishing result, given how desperately unwell she was by the time she entered the trial.
It occurs to me on a second reading that she may actually be the Cohort 1 "Stable Disease" patient, not the "Complete Response" patient - because they use that term "stabilized" (American spelling, sigh) in their text - not "remission" or "cured." LC has been quite explicit in saying that the Complete Response patient from Cohort 1 has no detectable cancer. If that is the case then I am even more impressed, Because I have tended to focus on the CR result without thinking so much about what "Stable Disease" can really mean for a patient who, like Michele, had seen her cancer "spreading into her adrenal glands, lymph nodes, brain, and chest" before starting the PD1-vaxx trial.
Either way, it's a fabulous indicator of what PD1-vaxx may be able to achieve. This is only a Phase 1 trial, aimed at testing safety and maximum effective dosage, but already we see some great clinical outcomes. Like you, Owl, I await the next PD1-vaxx report with huge interest.
And the Her-vaxx Phase 2 final results....
And the Check-vacc Phase 1 dose escalation report...
And the partnership studies of OnCARlytics with Celularity and Eureka.....
Not wonder it feels like waiting for Christmas.
Cheers
Dave
(20min delay)