Development of anticancer immunotherapy idea

Abstract

Over the decades, significant evolution of anticancer immunotherapy idea has been seen, involving the gradual discontinuation of active specific immunotherapy methods towards the use of antibodies for immune checkpoints. Clinical studies have shown limited effectiveness of “vaccines” containing antigens or whole tumor cells in the treatment of advanced melanoma, non-small-cell lung cancer and colon cancer as well as many other tumours. Immunotherapy using immune cells encounters major methodological problems, although the development of genetic engineering gives hope for the development of effective methods for adoptive immunotherapy (eg. with modified cytotoxic T lymphocytes). In contrast, the use of anti-CTLA-4, anti-PD-1 and anti-PD-L1 antibodies is possible to obtain long-term disease control in some patients with various types of cancer. The search for predictive factors of different immunotherapy methods is mandatory.