When an organ is transplanted, the immune system of the recipient will most likely recognize it as foreign tissue and attack it. The destruction of the organ will, if untreated, end in the death of the recipient.
To prevent that, immunosuppressant drugs are used to inhibit the reaction of the immune system. The downside is that with such a deactivated immune system, the body is very vulnerable to opportunistic infections, even those usually considered harmless. Also, prolonged use of immunosuppressants increases the risk of cancer.
Immunosuppression is also used to counteract autoimmune diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis or Crohn's disease, to prevent the immune system from attacking healthy parts of the body.
Cortisone was the first immunosuppressant identified. The more effective azathioprine was identified in 1959, but it was not until the discovery of cyclosporine in 1970 that transplant surgery found a sufficiently powerful immunosuppressive.
In the case of cancer, IRC hopes to induce an immunerejection attack on the tumor similar to the reaction that rejectsorgan and tissue transplants; part of this is induction of natural killer cells.
However, the immunesuppression seen is in large part due to other pre cancer conditions and it is this immunesuppression which has allowed the cancer to arise and survive.
The IRC immune restoration approach is basic to treating all forms of cancer, it is with the additional therapy directed to the specific tumor types that certain cancers require a specific approach, dependent on cancer cell type, stage of the cancer and the patients physical status.
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