'Game changer:' BC Cancer Agency opens immunotherapy lab in Victoria

The BC Cancer Agency opened a new research centre in Victoria on Monday focused on custom immunotherapy, which they call "one of the most promising areas in cancer research and care today."

Dr. Brad Nelson with the BC Cancer Agency told All Points West guest host David Lennam that the Conconi Family Immunotherapy Lab is just one of 20 or 30 such facilities worldwide working on what's called T cell therapy.

T cells are a type of white blood cell that fight tumours in a patient's body. At the Conconi lab, researchers will take samples of tumours and attempt to enhance the T cell response for each individual.

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"We'll be pulling [T cells] out of the tumour sample, growing them in a lab, activating them, rejuvenating them, and the patient then will, about a month later, receive an IV infusion of these T cells and will essentially flood their body with these cancer-fighting T cells," Nelson said.

"Just kind of hijack the immune system if you will and get it almost 100 percent focused on fighting the cancer. The patient is left with this supercharged, heightened T cell response against their cancer to protect them going forward."

Nelson says the Conconi lab will be focusing on patients who are no longer responding to more established treatments like chemotherapy, and at first, will be treating patients with ovarian, cervical and endometrial cancers.

Nelson says T cell therapy is the most exciting development he has seen in his career and research in the area has produced "fantastic" results.

"The best example being with advanced leukemias where T cell therapy is now yielding 90 percent complete response rates," he said. "So it's just been an absolute game changer for that disease."

The BC Cancer Agency says clinical trials for ovarian and cervical cancer at the Conconi lab are expected to begin in early 2017.

With files from CBC Radio One's All Points West

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