A Breast Cancer Vaccine Could Be Coming Soon

Active Senior African American woman setting up to help host a Breast Cancer Awareness campaign.

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Researchers from the University of Washington have developed a groundbreaking experimental vaccine that could possibly be used to treat breast cancer disease in the near future.

This week, researchers from the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle conducted a clinical trial with the newly developed vaccine. The study found that the medicine “safely gendered a strong immune response to a key tumor protein,” present in breast cancer cells, the report noted, according to Medical Press.

How was the vaccine created?

According to the study, researchers believe that the vaccine showed a positive response because of how the substance was designed. The vaccine used in the experiment contained the DNA instructions responsible for the tumor protein.

Once injected, the DNA begins to rapidly copy the protein encoded in the DNA’s instructions. The proteins then travel to the immune system “a process more likely to generate a strong, cytotoxic immune response,” the outlet noted.

“Because this was not a randomized clinical trial, the results should be considered preliminary, but the findings are promising enough that the vaccine will now be evaluated in a larger, randomized clinical trial,” said lead author Dr. Mary “Nora” L. Disis, a UW professor of medicine, Division of Medical Oncology, and director of the Cancer Vaccine in a statement.

The phase I trial was conducted to evaluate the safety of the vaccine and its ability to target a protein called human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2). Researchers wanted to see if the vaccine could generate an immune response to the protein.

All of the participants in the preliminary study showed positive results towards the end of the trial

Sixty-six women who had metastatic cancer participated in the groundbreaking study. All of the participants were given three injections of the vaccine in varied doses. They also received the “immune-stimulating drug granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF), which promotes cytotoxic immunity.”

Researchers closely monitored the participants for three to 13 years. Towards the end, the scientists found that all of the women had either achieved complete remission or only had tumor “remaining in their bone, which tends to grow slowly,” the report noted.

“The results showed that the vaccine was very safe,” Disis said. “In fact, the most common side effects that we saw in about half the patients were very similar to what you see with COVID vaccines: redness and swelling at the injection site and maybe some fever, chills and flu-like symptoms.”

Researchers hope that the vaccine can be used to treat breast cancer patients in the future.