JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Triple-negative breast cancer affects about 15-20 percent of women with breast cancer. Experts say it’s very aggressive and deadly.
The Mayo Clinic has received a $13.3 million dollar grant from the U.S. Department of Defense’s Breast Cancer Research Program to fund a clinical trial. Researchers believe they now have a vaccine that could bring new found hope to those who have been told in the past that there are no targeted therapies for the disease they’re fighting.
Donna Deegan of the Donna Foundation, is a three-time breast cancer survivor who battled triple-negative breast cancer. She was first diagnosed in 1999 and then again in 2002.
“I remember when I was first diagnosed with breast cancer and my daughter was really small and when I wrote my first book I wrote that I hope by the time she has to worry about this that cancer is just a word in the medical history books,” said Deegan. “She’s 23 now and I think we are a long way towards making that happen.”
The 26.2 with Donna Breast Cancer Marathon has raised more than $4 million since it launched eight years ago. That seed money has been planted into research at Mayo and has led to a vaccine designed to prevent the recurrence of triple-negative breast cancer.
“What we want to do is intervene during that period between conventional therapy and when they relapse and see if we can boost the body’s immune defenses to fight off that relapse,” said Dr. Keith Knutson in the Department of Immunology at Mayo Clinic’s Florida campus.
The Defense Department’s program studying breast cancer has awarded the Mayo Clinic a $13.3 million grant. Dr. Knutson who designed the vaccine, says this trial is the next step in the progress of moving a new drug from the laboratory into routine clinical use. Nearly 300 patients at clinical sites across the nation will take part in the testing.
“This is the first time. And it’s really exciting to see that for all of these women who have been told basically, ‘We don’t have anything for you besides chemotherapy,’ now ‘We do, maybe,'” said Deegan. “We’ll find out when this trial is done.”
Dr. Knutson says the vaccine would be applicable to a wide variety of cancers. So there’s a possibility that it could prevent the recurrence of other cancers as well. The clinical trial is expected to begin early next year. For information on trials, call the Mayo Clinic Cancer Center at 1-855-776-0015.