Dendritic Cell Treatment Shows Promise for Decreasing Viral Loads in Chronic
Hepatitis B: Presented at AAAAI
By Carole VanSickle Ellis
NEW ORLEANS -- February 28, 2010 -- Physician's treating patients with chronic
hepatitis B virus (cHBV) may be able to turn a decade's worth of cancer
research to their advantage when it comes to using dendritic cells (DCs) in
immune therapy protocols for these patients, researchers said here on February
27 at the 2010 American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) Annual
Meeting.
According to Leonid Titov, MD, Research Institute for Epidemiology and
Microbiology, Minsk, Belarus, and colleagues, since patients with cHBV have
impaired dendritic cell function, their immune systems are not able to produce
mature DCs.
However, a new maturation protocol being investigated for safety and efficacy
at the Research Institute for Epidemiology and Microbiology, allows for a new
form of DC therapy similar to conventional DC-based cancer therapies, for
patients with cHBV.
The 4 patients were male, aged 30 to 60 years, and had polymerase chain
reaction-proven cHBV for several years. They had been unsuccessfully treated
using standard protocols. Using peripheral blood taken from the patients, DCs
were prepared and then injected into the forearms of the patients. Once
injected, the patients were monitored for 7 days and then discharged from the
hospital. The other 2 injections were performed in the outpatient department
at 3-week intervals.
The number of DCs generated from 50 mL of blood was limited by the number of
circulating monocytes and the efficiency of isolation procedures. The cultures
were tested for sterility twice and were found free of microbial contaminants.
All of the patients tolerated the injections well, and no local or systemic
side effects were observed. All patients also demonstrated a clinical response
to therapy, typified by a significant decrease in viral load and alanine
aminotransferase levels 1 month after the DC injections.
Three of the 4 patients had an increase in CD4/CD8 index and CD3-CD16+, and
CD3-CD56+ cell count. These patients also showed elevated expression of CD28
by T cells after the treatment. One month after the study, HBV viral load was
undetectable in 2 of the 4 patients. The other 2 showed a significant
reduction.
The study indicated that there are no adverse effects of DC-based treatment of
patients with cHBV. In addition, short-term clinical efficacy of DC-based
immunotherapy was evident in all 4 patients.
The authors noted that advanced, multicentre trials will be needed to allow
for longer observation of patients in order to prove the sustained impact of
the treatment.
It should be noted that the same DC generation method could be implemented to
obtain antigen-specific DC from patients' blood with hepatitis C. These cells
can be loaded with hepatitis C virus nonstructural proteins to aid in
immune-based cellular therapy.
[Presentation title: Safety and Short Term Efficacy of Dendritic Cell Immune
Therapy in Patients With Chronic Hepatitis B. Abstract 50]作者: 富贵数字 时间: 2010-3-2 20:00
a new
form of DC therapy similar to conventional DC-based cancer therapies, for
patients with cHBV.
Any detailed description of this new way?作者: StephenW 时间: 2010-3-4 17:45 标题: 回复 4# 的帖子
It seems this research is new. It comes from Belarus (Russia) and was tested on only 4 patients. It is too early to say whether it will lead to a cure. Thank you for explaining to the others that I am only re-publishing, mainly from the Hepatitis-B Information & Support List based in the USA.作者: 走遍四方 时间: 2010-3-8 09:51
