Immunotherapy for Prostate Cancer in Delhi NCR – Patient Education

The prostate is a small gland present in the lower abdomen of men, under the bladder. It surrounds the urethra. The gland is regulated by testosterone and it is here when semen is produced. Prostate Cancer is cancer in the prostate, and it happens when the cells in the region become abnormal and begin to multiply at a very fast rate. In simple words, when a malignant tumor forms in the prostate, it is called prostate cancer.

It is a very serious disease that affects middle-aged men or older (typically above 65 years of age). While prostate cancer does not develop and spread rapidly, it can travel to the lymph nodes and seminal vesicles upon spreading. This is one of the major reasons why it takes a long time for the growth of prostate cancer to become detectable. To remain on the safer side, it is advised to regularly consult a Prostate Cancer Specialist in Delhi.

Prostate Cancer care involves the early diagnosis, treatment of early stage diseases. This involves adequate counseling and guidance to the patients. The support required to the patients involves staging, guiding optimum treatment outline that is surgery or radiotherapy or just follow up or surveillance.

Immunotherapy for prostate cancer works by helping a patient’s own immune system fight back against cancer cells. One immune therapy that has been approved by the FDA is a vaccine called sipuleucel-T (Provenge), which spurs a patient’s immune system to attack prostate cancer cells.

How is Immunotherapy for Prostate Cancer Changing the Outlook for Patients?

Immunotherapy for prostate cancer includes two FDA-approved treatment options and is a promising area of research for metastatic cancer treatment.

Prostate Cancer Treatment Options

Conventional treatments for early-stage prostate cancer include surgery and radiation. Hormonal therapy, which can reduce levels of the male hormones (androgens like testosterone) that lead to tumor growth, is also used to treat early-stage tumors. For advanced or metastatic prostate cancer, chemotherapy is also a treatment option.

Immunotherapy is class of treatments that take advantage of a person’s own immune system to help kill cancer cells. There are currently three FDA-approved immunotherapy options for prostate cancer.

Cancer Vaccines

Sipuleucel-T (Provenge®): a vaccine composed of patients’ own immune cells, which have been stimulated to target the PAP (prostatic acid phosphatase) protein highly expressed on prostate cancers; approved for subsets of patients with advanced prostate cancer
Immunomodulators

Dostarlimab (Jemperli): a checkpoint inhibitor that targets the PD-1/PD-L1 pathway; approved for subsets of patients with advanced prostate cancer that has DNA mismatch repair deficiency (dMMR)
Pembrolizumab (Keytruda®): a checkpoint inhibitor that targets the PD-1/PD-L1 pathway; approved for subsets of patients with advanced prostate cancer that has high microsatellite instability (MSI-H), DNA mismatch repair deficiency (dMMR), or high tumor mutational burden (TMB-H)
In cases where the patient’s prostate cancer is resistant to testosterone level reduction via hormone therapy, treatment options are few. Several immunotherapy options are currently in clinical trials for patients with advanced prostate cancer.