Traditional cancer treatments often include chemotherapy, radiation or both. But chemo and radiation kill healthy cells as well as malignant ones, and the side effects are legendary.Sometimes surgery is the best option, but most people have some combination of chemo, radiation and surgery.Overall, cancer treatment is becoming more focused. For example, women with early stage breast cancer can have focused radiation after the tumor is removed.In these cases, weak radiation beams from many different angles, hit the place where the tumor was. Dr. Julia White at Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center recently completed a study that showed these results. Plus, White says, partial radiation takes less time.“The short five-day treatment is just as good as the whole breast irradiation for four to six weeks,” she said.ImmunotherapyDr. William Nelson, at Johns Hopkins Medicine, says immunotherapy where the body’s own immune system fights the cancer is going to get wider use.“It’s now pretty clear that the immune system sees cancer cells, sees them as abnormal, and if we unleash the power of the immune system, it can attack and destroy the cancer cells in a very helpful way,” he said.Precision medicineStill another treatment involves testing the genetic makeup of cancer cells and using medicine designed to kill only those cells. Dr. Marcia Brose at the Abramson Cancer Center, University of Pennsylvania specializes in this technique, called genomic testing and precision medicine.“We’re talking about targeting cells at the very core of what made them a cancer to begin with, and that’s what precision medicine is really about,” she said.Brose spoke by Skype. Each patient’s cancer is unique, just like their DNA. Knowing the cancer’s makeup helps doctors determine what medicine will work best. Healthy cells are left alone, and, Brose says, few patients have any side effects.“And the couple that I’ve had, if I just dropped the dose one level, not only is the side effect gone, but the treatment still remains effective,” she said.Brose cautions that this treatment isn’t for everyone.“Right now, where I think the biggest impact is being felt is for those patients whose cancer is not cured, that comes back over and over again, or actually spreads to other parts of the body,” she said.Brose says many of her patients whose cancer was considered terminal are not only alive but also healthy.“I get this patient in who’s been told he’s only going to around for three months, and he’s got a cancer that typically is not treatable, even with chemotherapy, these patients don’t do well,” she said. “And I meet a woman who has sarcoma who was in a wheelchair and on oxygen, and in my lifetime that person would be gone in a year, and here it is three years later, and she’s hiking with her kids.”This treatment isn’t for everyone, but cancer specialists think targeted therapy, whether partial radiation, immunotherapy or the genomic testing followed by precision medicine is the future of cancer treatment.
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