According to a new study published in the journal Nature, researchers have found a way to enhance the effects of this therapeutic approach in glioblastoma, a deadly type of brain cancer, and possibly boost patient survival.
 

The research, funded by the National Institutes of Health, is the latest to confirm the benefits immunotherapy, suggesting it may soon become a standard of cancer care — alongside surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy.
 

The study, conducted by the Brain Tumor Immunotherapy Program at the University of Florida in Gainesville, focused on dendritic cells — specialized immune cells that help to fight disease and infections. Dendritic cells have been used for immunotherapy to target a variety of tumor types, including those that affect the brain.
 

The cells are taken from a patient, engineered in the lab to target tumor cells, and then injected back into the patient to activate T cells, which can fight tumors and also prevent cancer cells from coming back.
 

"The promise of dendritic cell-based therapy and other immunotherapies for brain cancer has been upheld for some time, but an important implication of this work is a demonstrated capacity to significantly improve the clinical impact of immunotherapy for patients with this very difficult disease," said Duane A. Mitchell, M.D., who helped lead the new research.
 

"We did not expect that enhancing dendritic cell migration would be associated with such a dramatic improvement on clinical outcomes in our patients."