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Provenge: Breakthrough
Prostate Cancer Treatment

5 Questions Answered About The
Latest Treatment For Prostate Cancer

Breakthrough. Novel. Cutting Edge. First-of-its-kind. All terms I've seen used to describe the recently FDA approved treatment for advanced prostate cancer - Provenge. This drug is making waves by offering hope to thousands of seriously ill men suffering with advanced prostate cancer. But is it hype or real promise? Let's answer a few frequently asked questions.

What is it exactly?

You could say it's a boutique form of immunotherapy. The idea is to stimulate your body to seek out, attack and kill prostate cancer cells. In essence it's a way to harness your immune system to respond to the cancer.

How does it work?

What happens is your white blood cells are mixed with a bio-engineered molecule that is much like one seen on almost all prostate cancer cells. After processing, your white blood cells are then returned to your body via a course of three transfusions spaced out over a roughly 30 day period. "Armed and dangerous" so to speak, your processed while blood cells have been trained to in essence target the malignant cancer cells as they would any invading disease organism. So that once unleashed they go after the cancer cells much like they would a common cold virus.

How is it different?

Provenge is said to be more vaccine than drug though it does not prevent cancer. And since it takes the white blood cells of a given patient and infuses them with a protein present in prostate cancer each version of the drug is unique and labor intense to produce. The goal is to help bolster your immune system to ward off the cancer. Even better the side effects are nothing like those experienced with other treatments for prostate cancer. Limited mostly to flu like symptoms including chills and fever for a day or two for most.

Who is it for?

Not everyone with prostate cancer. Provenge is designed for those suffering from advanced prostate cancer whose cancer has spread to other parts of the body. Ideally for the difficult-to-treat who have no pain associated with their cancer. It can also be administered for patients where cancer has reoccurred after hormone therapy treatment.

What are the drawbacks?

With only enough to meet maybe 2% of total demand it's being limited at first only to sites that participated in clinical trials So as you'd imagine waiting lists dwarf the manufacturer, Dendreon Corp.'s, ability to produce the medicine. Which means the tumor-fighting vaccine is hard to get hold of and the company is not making it available everywhere.

The drug is not exactly cheap coming to around $93,000 for a course of treatments. Given that sticker price insurance companies are balking at covering the costs of treatment. Although Medicare is going to cover 80%.

While an exciting advance, when compared to those who got a placebo, it extends the life of a patient only by a four months or so.

Still more likely than not, researchers are looking for ways to use your own immune system to fight various cancer tumors. If advances like this in the war on cancer don't get you excited then nothing will.

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