Immunotherapy

Immunotherapy uses drugs or treatments that are specifically designed to help stimulate or strengthen the immune system in order to more effectively target and/or fight cancer cells.

For instance, immune checkpoint inhibitors, a common form of immunotherapy, help fight cancer by preventing these cancer-fighting immune cells from switching off too early and before their work is done.

Houston Methodist uses immunotherapy to treat certain cancers, including breast cancer, lung cancer and head and neck cancers.

Many different forms of immunotherapy are used to treat cancer, including:

• Immune checkpoint inhibitors – drugs that help immune cells react more strongly to cancer by blocking the checkpoints that allow these immune cells to switch off
• T-cell therapies – includes tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) therapy and CAR T-cell therapy, in which cancer-specific immune cells are grown to large numbers in the lab. This expanded amount of immune cells is then returned back to you to more effectively fight the cancer.
• Monoclonal antibodies – immune system proteins designed in the lab to serve various purposes, including to make cancer cells more obvious to the immune system, block surface molecules that help cancer cells grow, and deliver drugs or radioactive particles to cancer cells, specifically
• Cancer vaccines – given to cause an immune response to a specific disease, such as the vaccine against human papilloma virus (HPV), which can cause cervical cancer

Immunotherapy alters your immune response and immune system, and the following side effects can result:

• Rashes
• Flu-like symptoms – fever, chills, headache, muscle aches, fatigue, weakness and nausea
• Low blood pressure
• Breathing problems
• Vomiting
• Diarrhea
• Thinning hair