GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Researchers at UF Health in Gainesville are making one of the biggest discoveries in cancer research over the past decade.
When it comes to brain cancer, researchers say the therapies have stayed the same for decades with poor outcomes for patients, until now.
“It completely reprograms it to heal cancer and not kill it,” said Dr. Elias Sayour, UF Health Neurosurgery & Pediatrics Associate Professor.
Sayour is talking about what he and his research team at UF Health have been working on for the past seven years.
A brain cancer mRNA vaccine – custom made for each patient, using their own tumor cells.
“Each booster is amplifying a personalized immune system, so in many, each patient and each vaccine is a very unique experience,” Sayour told First Coast News.
While each cancer case Sayour has worked on is different, all the treatments are the same: radiation, chemotherapy, surgery, repeat.
"The problem with vaccines is they're just, they're always behind," Sayour explained. "Yes, you get a response and that risk, but that response is not enough. So, we designed a vaccine that would work much more rapidly, within hours."
The vaccine reprograms the immune system to attack the tumor, the same way it would attack a virus.
So far, four cancer patients have seen success throughout the UF Health research team's clinical trials.
The one symptom that's hard for Sayour to treat -- fear.
“There's tremendous fear on my part, on the part of all the providers and the part of the family, the patient, of course,” he mentioned.
Sayour hopes with developing the mRNA cancer vaccine, it will give more than just treatment, but hope.
“If it can fight something foreign like cancer which is foreign, then it can remember it and remember it for life and protect these children lifelong,” Sayour said.
So, what happens next?
The vaccine is on to phase two for clinical trials, growing from four to 25 adult and children cancer patients that will use the vaccine to treat their own tumors.