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Biological Therapy
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Biological therapy is a type of
treatment that works with your immune system. It can help fight cancer
or help control side effects (how your body reacts to the drugs you are
taking) from other cancer treatments like chemotherapy.
What is the difference between biological therapy and chemotherapy?
Biological
therapy and chemotherapy are both treatments that fight cancer. While
they may seem alike, they work in different ways. Biological therapy
helps your immune system fight cancer. Chemotherapy attacks the cancer
cells directly.
How does biological therapy fight cancer?
Doctors are not sure how biological therapy helps your immune system fight cancer. But they think it may:
Stop or slow the growth of cancer cells.Make it easier for your immune system to destroy, or get rid of, cancer cells.Keep cancer from spreading to other parts of your body.
There
are many kinds of biological therapy. Here are the names of some common
ones with ways to say them and brief statements about how they are used
in cancer care.
Treatments for cancer:
- BCG or Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (ba-SIL-us KAL-met gay-RAIN) treats bladder tumors or bladder cancer.
- IL-2 or Interleukin-2 (in-ter-LOO-kin 2) treats certain types of cancer.
- Interferon alpha (in-ter-FEER-on AL-fa) treats certain types of cancer.
- Rituxan or Rituximab (ri-TUX-i-mab) treats non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.
- Herceptin (her-SEP-tin) or Trastuzumab treats breast cancer.
Treatments for controlling side effects:
- Neupogen (NU-po-jen) or G-CSF increases white blood cell counts and helps prevent infection in people who are getting chemotherapy.
- Procrit, Epogen, or Erythropoietin (e-RITH-ro-po-i-tin) helps make red blood cells in people who have anemia.
- IL-11, Interleukin-11, Oprelvekin (oh-PREL-ve-kin), or Neumega helps make platelets (a type of blood cell).
Cancer
vaccines are a form of biological therapy. While other vaccines (like
ones for measles or mumps) are given before you get sick, cancer
vaccines are given after you have cancer. Cancer vaccines may help your
body fight the cancer and keep it from coming back.
Doctors
are learning more all the time about cancer vaccines. They are now
doing research about how cancer vaccines can help people diagnosed with
melanoma, lymphoma, and kidney, breast, ovarian, prostate, colon, and
rectal cancers.
Source information:
The Web site of the National Cancer Institute (http://www.cancer.gov)
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