Since opening its doors more than 100 years ago, Aurora St. Luke's
Medical Center has become a top-notch tertiary care center, dedicated to
finding new and better ways to provide patient-centered medical care.
Following in the medical center's rich tradition of innovation and
advancement, the Immunotherapy Program at Aurora St. Luke's was
developed 20 years ago to conduct research and offer customized
treatments for patients with cancer.
A new study for patients with melanoma
In a recent study at the National Cancer Institute (Journal of
Clinical Oncology, 23:2346, 2005), 18 out of 35 patients with advanced,
recurrent melanoma experienced cancer shrinkage after treatment with a
combination of chemotherapy, tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL) and
immune therapy with interleukin-2. TIL are immune cells that are
generated from the patient's own tumor, then manipulated in the
laboratory to become potent cancer killers.
There is no other treatment available for patients with advanced
melanoma that results in this high response rate. Our goal in the
Immunotherapy Program is to offer this exciting, new treatment
opportunity to patients with melanoma at St. Luke's in late 2008 .
For more information, call our nurse coordinator at 414-649-5818.
