The research group focuses on the application of immunotherapy for the treatment of gynecologic malignancies, notably cervical cancer, ovarian cancer, and endometrial and serous papillary carcinomas of the uterus.
Cervical cancer is the second most common cause of cancer-related deaths in women worldwide.
An appealing and novel approach to cancer treatment that is generating a great deal of interest is the possibility that the patient's own immune system may be induced to attack the cancer. This is an attractive idea because the immune response against the cancer would be highly specific and would not be accompanied by the often severe side effects associated with conventional chemotherapy and radiation. They have recently shown that specialized and powerful immune stimulating cells, known as dendritic cells, can process tumor proteins, or antigens, and induce immune responses against cervical cancer. Importantly, we found that these immune responses, which are mediated by cytotoxic T lymphocytes, or CTL, are capable of attacking and killing tumor cells from cervical cancer patients. This protocol represents the first investigator-initiated cancer immunotherapy trial at UAMS and in the State of Arkansas.