Second Nature Care Blog

FDA Grants Breakthrough Status - Brain Cancer Treatment

[fa icon="calendar'] Jun 7, 2016 6:34:08 AM / by Winter Ninivaggi

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The FDA has granted breakthrough status to using the polio virus to treat cancer.

Glioblastoma is a form of brain cancer that thus far has had no cure. The tumor spreads fast and aggressively. Currently it is treated through surgery, radiation and chemotherapy

The FDA has granted breakthrough status to using the polio virus to treat cancer. It is being used to treat glioblastoma, a diagnosis that typically leaves a patient with only months to live.

Duke University has been so successful in trials with the virus that the FDA is allowing this to be "fast tracked" to patients while it is still being evaluated. Dr Gromeier chose to use the polio virus because it literally seeks out and attaches itself to a receptor found on the surface of cells that are on just about every kind of tumor.

By re-engineering the virus and removing a key genetic sequence, Dr. Gromeier made it impossible for the virus to cause paralysis or death and cannot reproduce in normal cells. In cancer cells it can and does reproduce, along with releasing poisonous toxins into the tumor cells.

According to Dr. Gromeier, cancerous tumors are covered by a protective shield that makes them invisible to the immune system. By infecting the tumor with the polio virus the shield is breached and the immune system can begin attacking the tumor.

The immune system thinks it is attacking the polio virus, but really, it is just aggressively attacking the tumor.

The trials are currently in Phase 1, with breakthrough status, the trials will be expanded to multiple institutions which is Phase 2 and with positive results from Phase 2, Phase 3 will be skipped. This would mean the Polio treatment will be available to all patients with glioblastoma.

The treatment has already been used to cure multiple patients, completely, of the aggressive brain cancer. In one case, a patient who was non-receptive to chemotherapy received the polio treatment and then with one more session of chemotherapy, the cancer was gone. Although some of the trial participants have passed away, the results from the successful patients are so promising that FDA is pushing this, and fast.

We are excited to see the progression of this treatment into its final stages of dosage and development.

Here is the link to the original article it also provides actual patient accounts: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-fda-breakthrough-status-duke-university-cancer-therapy/

 

 

 

 

Topics: Brain Health, Cancers

Winter Ninivaggi

Written by Winter Ninivaggi

Isadora Guggenheim, ND, FNP, RN, MS, CNS, LMT, owner of Second Nature Naturopathic Care, LLC
For all appointments: Tel: 845 358-8385 Fax: 845 358-2963 drguggenheim@msn.com