Dendritic Cell Therapy or Dendritic Cell Vaccine Therapy

These are a newly emerging and potent form of immune therapy used to treat cancer, AIDS and other serious conditions. In case of cancer, Dendritic Cell therapy is an immune therapy which harnesses the body's own immune system to fight cancer. Although Dendritic Cells are potent cells, they are not usually present in adequate quantity to allow for a potent immune response. Dendritic Cell Therapy thus involves the harvesting of blood cells (ie monocytes or macrophages) from a patient and processing them in the laboratory to produce Dendritic Cells which are then given back to a patient in order to allow massive Dendritic participation in optimally activating the immune system.

Purpose of implantation of dendritic cells or dendritic cell vaccines

The unique property of CD8+ cytolytic T lymphocytes is their ability to destroy cancer cells without any damage to the surrounding normal cells of the organism. By implantation of dendritic cells the numbers and performance of patient's own dendritic cells as activators of cancer-killing CD8+ T cells is heightened.

As all cancer cells are in principle of monoclonal origin, the therapeutically most effective type of dendritic cells, and of dendritic cell vaccines, are autologous, e.g. prepared from the patient's own blood, and in case of dendritic cell vaccine also from the patient's own cancerous tissue. For that reason Bio Stem Cell Research Organization has focused on the preparation of autologous dendritic cells and autologous dendritic cell vaccines for implantation.

Whenever possible, when patient's cancerous tissue is available, in a fresh or frozen form, but not in formalin, dendritic cell vaccine, e.g. "primed dendritic cells", rather than dendritic cells, should be used in clinical practice.