The National Cancer Institute awarded an $8 million grant to
the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine to study the
effects of photodynamic light therapy (PDT) in patients with malignant pleural
mesothelioma. The grant will fund a
clinical trial and additional studies looking at the effects of PDT on the
patient’s immune response, the mesothelioma tumor cell , and the blood vessels
surrounding the tumor.
Dr. Eli Glatstein is the principal investigator of the
program. He is also the professor and vice chair of Radiation Oncology, and
member of Penn’s Mesothelioma and Pleural Program. According to Dr. Glatstein, “This trial represents a major step in
understanding the combination of treatment modalities that will offer patients
the best hope for survival and extended remission.”
The study expects to enroll 102 patients over four years. Patient will be administered Photofrin, a
photosensitizing agent that makes cancer cells more sensitive to dying from
light therapy, 24 hours prior to surgery.
The patients will then undergo a radical pleurectomy. The patents will then be divided into
two groups: half will receive PDT intraoperatively via an intense laser
inserted in the chest cavity during the surgery, along with post-operative
standard chemotherapy; and half who will receive only post-operative
chemotherapy. Photofrin absorbs the light from the laser and produces an active
form of oxygen that can destroy residual microscopic cancer cells left behind
after surgery.
“PDT has been a part of our treatment regimen along with a
lung-sparing surgery for many years, but a randomized clinical trial such as
this remains necessary to prove its efficacy,” says Glatstein.
PDT is known to kill cancer cells, but researchers also seek
to understand the patient’s immune response, the tumor microenvironment and the
blood vessels in and surrounding the tumor in three additional studies funded
under the grant.
“This trial will help
us understand how PDT works in the body and what we may be able to do in the
future to improve the body’s response to the therapy,” says Glatstein.
