Does Immunotherapy Work For Bile Duct Cancer

Cholangiocarcinoma also known as bile duct cancer is steadily rising in incidence worldwide.

Does immunotherapy work for bile duct cancer.

Immunotherapy is a new cancer treatment approach that uses drugs vaccines and other therapies to activate the immune system s natural defenses so it can fight cancer. Many of these drugs are being tested in clinical trials to see if they might help treat bile duct cancer. October 29 2015 by nci staff. Symptoms often go undetected until the disease is far advanced.

To learn more about how drugs that work on the immune system are used to treat cancer see cancer immunotherapy. National cancer institute steve rosenberg m d. Study tests combination immunotherapy in advanced bile duct cancer. Immunotherapy is the use of medicines to help a person s immune system better recognize and destroy cancer cells.

It can be used to treat some advanced bile duct cancers that cannot be removed by surgery or have spread to distant areas after at least one previous chemotherapy treatment. There are not yet any fda approved immunotherapies for bile duct cancer but researchers are actively conducting clinical trials. Immunotherapy for bile duct cancer. Surgical resection of tumors is considered the best approach toward attempting a cure but less than half of patients whose tumors are surgically resected survive past five years and those whose tumors are not surgically removed face a median survival time of just.

Pemigatinib pemazyre a fgfr2 inhibitor blocks the abnormal fgfr2 protein in bile duct cancer cells and keeps them from growing and spreading to other places. These drugs enter the bloodstream and reach all areas of the body making this treatment useful for some cancers that have spread to organs beyond the bile duct.