Dr. Brody on In Situ Vaccinations for Hematologic Cancers

Joshua Brody, MD, director, Lymphoma program, Icahn School of Medicine, Mount Sinai, discusses the development of in situ vaccinations, a vaccine that is created at the tumor site in patients with cancer.

Brody clarifies how cancer vaccines work. The vaccine is used in a therapeutic way rather than to prevent disease. With the vaccine, researchers are teaching a patient’s immune system to recognize cancer.

The in situ approach takes advantage of the fact that the immune system has the tools to stop cancer. The immune system can recognize the cancer at the tumor site where tumor antigens are collected. If they can be mobilized in an immunogenic way, the immune system can in turn recognize the cancer. By using the vaccine at 1 site to induce immune response, T cells will travel throughout the body to kill tumors throughout the body.

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