STAT Plus: For cancer immunotherapies, a radioactive crystal ball might foretell success or failure

By SHARON BEGLEY

VICTOR SEGURA IBARRA AND RITA SERDA, PH.D., NCI, NIH

The whole point of the game-changing cancer immunotherapies is to get armadas of T cells sailing into battle against tumors. But for some patients there’s a fundamental problem: Their T cells aren’t armed — or, in bio-speak, “activated,” a big reason why many patients aren’t helped by much-hyped new therapies.

If a new technique reported on Monday works in people as well as it does in lab mice, however, physicians will be able to tell almost immediately if a patient’s immune system is armed and, if it’s not, quickly switch therapies, increase dosages, or just spare patients often-serious side effects.