Cancer immunotherapy confers a global benefit

Abstract

Cancer is one of the leading causes of mortality, morbidity, and decreased quality of life worldwide. On the other hand, current standards of care have failed to do much for many patients with cancer. Hence, a new therapeutic avenue like immunotherapy is needed to improve the care of cancer patients. Immunotherapy helps health-care providers prevent not only cancer development but also prevent its further progression and cancer-related complications, offering prevention from cancers at primary, secondary, and tertiary levels. Targeting the immune system to control infections known as causes of cancer variables, as well as conditions associated with chronic inflammation (i.e., autoimmunities), results in dramatic decrease in the incidence of cancers. Modulation of immune response in favor of enhancing tumor cell detection and immune clearance of these cells are what immunotherapy does. In addition, immunotherapy helps recover an injured or completely destroyed immune system after intensive cancer therapies as occurred in intensive chemotherapy schedules. A broad spectrum of immunotherapeutic medications has been developed to treat patients with cancers. Adoptive cell therapy, therapeutic cancer vaccines, immune adjuvants, cytokines, monoclonal antibodies, and gene therapies are already established to treat different cancers. It should be borne in mind that immunotherapy-induced tumor destruction may appear with delay after a period of tumor progression and metastasis. By contrast, response to other standards of care of cancer patients including surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy appears early with obvious reduction of tumor size and metastasis. It highlights the significance of development of immune-related response criteria nearby classic World Health Organization (WHO) criteria and Response Evaluation Criteria In Solid Tumors (RECIST). Immunotherapy can also ameliorate the toxic effects of other available therapeutic modalities known as supportive immunotherapy. At this stage, immunotherapy prevents further disabilities due to cancer progression or therapies and improves quality of life of patients. Accordingly, cancer immunotherapy confers a global benefit and everybody all around the world has the right to benefit from this novel therapeutic avenue.