Cancer remains among the leading causes of death worldwide. The World Health Organization reported that the disease accounted for 8.8 million deaths in 2015.
With the advent of targeted treatments and therapies, the latest of which is immunotherapy, patients now have more options that may help them in their cancer journey.
Immunotherapy has been regarded as a “gentler” treatment route and has already been approved in the country for several types of cancers. Currently, these approved indications include the following types of cancers: lung, melanoma, head and neck, gastric, bladder, and Hodgkin lymphoma.
Dr. Oscar Chan, a lung and head and neck cancer specialist from the Hong Kong Integrated Oncology Centre, recently talked about how the treatment is making breakthroughs in (lung) cancer management in his country—where around 4,700 individuals are diagnosed with cancer annually.
Immunotherapy, according to Dr. Chan, was first introduced and applied in Hong Kong in 2014 for patients who were not responding to first-line cancer treatments such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
He mentioned that those who responded best to the treatment were non-small cell lung cancer patients whose cells showed a high level of a protein biomarker called PD-L1, the expression of which may help medical experts recommend the correct treatment route.
“In the past, majority of lung cancer patients can only live up to one year, with the median survival of only around a year to 17 months,” said Dr. Chan. “However, with immunotherapy, patients may now live longer—the response rates are high and more consistent.”
Dr. Chan said the current estimated five-year survival rate for stage 4 lung cancer patients is now around 16 percent, significantly more than the previous rate of 3 percent.
The specialist cited the case of a 70-year-old male patient who developed a tumor on his right bronchus—a growth which obstructed his airway and caused breathing difficulty, which also contributed to the presence of blood in his sputum. The initial treatment was applied through radiation and first-line chemotherapy, but the tumor still grew.
His doctors, as a response to the results, switched the treatment to second-line chemotherapy, a route which did not yield the intended effect. The patient’s disease further progressed, and his right lung eventually collapsed. Immunotherapy was then administered to the patient, applied through an immune checkpoint blocker. In just 14 days, his situation had improved.
Dr. Chan later took a radiograph of the patient’s chest and discovered the tumor had shrunk and it was no longer blocking his bronchus. With the tumor’s size reduced, the patient’s lung was now able to expand and his sputum did not yield any more blood.
“This patient is currently still on immunotherapy, and we have found that his quality of life has not been compromised,” said Dr. Chan.
Due to the observed benefits of immunotherapy, increasing access to it—to give better support to cancer patients—is encouraged.
Local initiatives, such as the Hope From Within multi-stakeholder advocacy, for instance, continually push for greater and strengthened efforts to fight cancer, stressing that close collaboration will be the key to ensure that proper testing methods, treatments, care options, and systems are in place—especially for those who need it the most.
Recently, the Hope From Within – Cancer Game Plan PH was launched, a campaign that aims to put the patients at the heart of the fight against the dreaded disease. Using powerful voices from leaders, advocates, policymakers, survivors, support groups, and patients, it boosted awareness of right cancer care, sparking conversations and purposive actions on how to save more patients from cancer-related mortalities and burdens.