BOWEL cancer patients could be cured without surgery or chemo using a drug that harnesses their own immune system.
Everyone given the immunotherapy pembrolizumab in a trial was cancer-free after treatment and six in 10 did not need an operation as well.
Surgery is the standard treatment with chemotherapy afterwards to finish off the tumours.
Treatment with the drug before an op was enough to cure more than half of patients in the study, and slashed the risk of relapse for the rest.
The blockbuster medication, known as Keytruda, is already used on the NHS for other types of cancer.
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Trial leader Dr Kai-Keen Shiu, from University College London, said: “Our results show this is a safe and highly effective treatment that increases the chances of curing the disease at an early stage.”
Bowel tumours are the third most common form of the disease in England, with 43,000 cases per year.
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About 3,000 Brits each year get the type of tumour studied in the trial, which was stage two or three MMR deficient/MSI-high cancer.
Genetic mutations make it difficult to eradicate so doctors tried treating 32 patients with pembrolizumab for nine weeks before surgery to improve their chances.
It is an infusion that blocks a cancer’s ability to switch off the immune system.
This means a patient’s own white blood cells can be released to tackle the tumour naturally.
If you melt away the tumour before surgery you normally triple survival chances
Dr Kai-Keen Shiu
Fifty-nine per cent of people in the study, presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology conference, were already cancer-free before their surgery date.
The remaining 41 per cent went into remission after both treatments.
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Dr Shiu added: “If you melt the cancer away before surgery you normally triple survival chances.
“Currently the chance of surviving for three years after surgery without relapse is about 75 per cent, but we hope this treatment will get closer to 90 to 100 per cent.”
Professor Mark Saunders, from The Christie cancer hospital in Manchester, said: “This is a very exciting new treatment for the 10 to 15 per cent of patients who have the right genetic make-up.
“Immunotherapy prior to surgery could become a game-changer for these patients.
“Not only is the outcome better but it saves patients from having more conventional chemotherapy, which often has more side-effects.
“In the future, immunotherapy may even replace the need for surgery.”
