A kind of immunotherapy--extracting a cancer patient’s own white blood cells and re-engineering them to destroy the cancer cells--is raising hope.
Dr. Aaron Rapoport, who heads cellular therapy at the University of Maryland’s Greenebaum Comprehensive Cancer Center, says in about half the three hundred patients he’s treated with this therapy, the cancer is gone. Kathy Ruehle, an oncology nurse for 36 years, manages the program:
“I can honestly say that this has been one of the most exciting times and one of the most hopeful times in care because of the opportunity that this therapy affords patients who may otherwise not have therapy to help them.”
The we talk with Sonia Su, who was out of options after she relapsed twice with aggressive lymphoma. Now cancer-free, she’s working to help other patients.
