When I read a recent press release from the Hutch that twenty-seven out of 29 patients with an advanced blood cancer who received an experimental, “living” immunotherapy were experiencing sustained remissions, I took it personally as great news! You see, my youngest brother, Norm, was one of those 27 patients, benefitting from this radical new treatment of cancer.
Some of the patients in the trial, which began in 2013, were originally not expected to survive for more than a few months because their disease had previously relapsed or was resistant to other treatments. So, our family was very worried about Norm. He had just taken early retirement from Cisco and was looking forward to exploring life in new ways, then ‘wham!’ - time to think about cancer now! And he was not responding well to chemo..
In this segment, Norm shares with us his experiences with this new approach to cancer, a little about how it works, how he feels, and what the future of cancer therapy might be..
