Israeli researchers have developed a treatment that has been significantly successful in treating multiple myeloma. The groundbreaking therapy is said to have a 90% success rate at bringing patients with this deadly disease into remission.

According to the American Cancer Society, multiple myeloma is an incurable form of cancer in plasma cells, which are found in the bone marrow and are an important part of the immune system. It’s a relatively rare form of cancer that strikes about 35,730 men and women annually and causes about 12,590 deaths. Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy is a type of cancer immunotherapy that helps the body’s own immune system find and attack cancer cells. Six CAR-T cell therapies have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of blood cancers, including multiple myeloma, but the cost is prohibitive at $450,000 per patient, says the National Cancer Institute.

The Israeli researchers were able to fine tune this treatment so it will be more affordable and available to patients around the world.

According to the Jerusalem Post, Hadassah University Medical Center in Jerusalem announced an “unprecedented achievement” in the treatment of multiple myeloma cancer. The innovative therapy was developed after a series of experiments performed in the hospital’s bone marrow transplant and immunotherapy department in recent years. Patients responded well, said the researchers.

“Now, in light of impressive results of CAR-T treatments, it seems that they have many more years to live — and with an excellent quality of life,” said Polina Stepensky, director of the Department of Bone Marrow Transplantation and Immunotherapy for Adults and Children.

The treatment is based on genetic engineering technology, which boosts the patient’s own immune system to destroy the cancer. More than 90% of the 74 patients treated at Hadassah went into complete remission, according to the Post.

“We have a waiting list of more than 200 patients from Israel and various part of the world at any given time,” Stepensky said. “Due to the complexity of the production and the complexity of the treatment itself, only one patient a week enters the treatment, which is still being conducted as an experiment.” Stepensky added that they have achieved a very positive overall response rate with minimal side effects.

“These are dramatic results,” the researcher said. “This is a huge hope for patients with a disease that has not yet had a cure.”

The CAR-T treatment begins by isolating T cells from the patient’s white blood cells and genetically engineering them to fight cancer cells. These engineered cells are injected into the patient where they ultimately target and destroy the cancer.

Until now, the treatment has only been available in China and the U.S. for hundreds of thousands of dollars and is very limited in its availability.

“Only 20% of those who need to receive it in these countries actually get it,” said Stepensky. “With the development led by researchers at our Danny Cunniff Leukemia Research Laboratory, we were able to reduce the price dramatically and make the treatment affordable and accessible.

“Moreover, Hadassah developed a more sophisticated and advanced treatment than that offered in the world. As the first and only institution in Israel that develops, manufactures, and delivers CAR-T treatment, Hadassah is actually leading the field that will enable the development of future treatments with CAR-T cells for the benefit of patients with other types of cancer.”

Stepensky said that the American company IMMX Biopharma has acquired a patent license and clinical trials are scheduled in the near future in the U.S.

“The plan is to reach commercialization and FDA approval as a drug within a year,” she said.