Immunotherapy is a new technology in medical knowledge for curing cancer. Treatment with Immunotherapy as mentioned in the www.thealthbenefitsof.com is a type of treatment by helping the body immune in against cancer. We know that the immune system helps fight infections including cancer cells. It consists of white blood cells, tissues of the lymph system and organs.
Disease therapy with the Immunotherapy system is using substances from living organisms to treat cancer. This cancer treatment has several types, among which there are directly against cancer and some are not direct.
Immunotherapy that helps immunity and directly fight cancer is:
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1. Adoptive cell transfer
This is a treatment by trying to increase the ability of T cells to kill cancer. These cells are taken from your tumor, the most powerful cells against cancer are those that grow in large numbers in the laboratory.
The process of forming T cells in the laboratory takes a long time, this can be 2 to 8 weeks. While the time before T cells grow, you must be treated with chemotherapy to reduce the immunity of cancer cells. Then, after the enlarged T cells in the lab, it will be injected to your blood vessels to fight cancer cells.
2. Checkpoint inhibitors
This is a drug that can respond to cancer strongly because it can help the body’s immunity. This drug does not directly attack tumor cells but it interferes with cancer cells so cannot avoid from immune attack.
3. Monoclonal antibodies
This is also a drug that is made in the laboratory, it is a therapeutic antibody, a form of immune proteins that are made in the laboratory. This antibody is designed to attach to cancer cells and then damage them. Some antibodies immediately stop cancer cells and consequently cancer cells will damage themselves. While others are in charge of carrying toxins in cancer cells, so the cancer cells be dead slowly.
4. Treatment vaccines
Cancer vaccine works by increasing the immune response in cancer. This is a vaccine specifically against cancer that is not useful for preventing cancer.
The following type of immunotherapy works by increasing the body’s response to cancer.
1. Cytokines
This is protein derived from the body, it has benefits in responding to the immune system to kill cancer. To treat cancer, there are two types of cytokines, these are interleukins and interferons.
2. BCG
BCG (Bacillus Calmette-Guérin) is an immunotherapy technology in the treatment of cancer specifically used for the treatment of bladder cancer. Occurs with urinary infections due to the weak bacteria that causes tuberculosis. When BCG is injected into the bladder, there will be an immune reaction to absorb cancer cells.
That’s some kind of cancer treatment with immunotherapy. Now we see who can use this therapy.
Who Can Receive Immunotherapy
In cancer treatment such as chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation therapy, this technology has not been widely used. But immunotherapy can already be used for the treatment of various types of cancer.
In addition to the above types of immunotherapy, many other immunotherapies are still in laboratory clinical trials.