First subject vaccinated with investigational vaccine for early-stage hemangiosarcoma in combination with standard treatment Hemangiosarcoma, or HSA, is a common and uniformly fatal cancer in dogs, with particularly high incidence in some popular breeds . PHOENIX , Sept. 30, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Calviri , a biotech company developing off-the-shelf therapeutic and preventative cancer vaccines for dogs and people, has announced the launch of an investigational trial aimed at treating dogs with early-stage hemangiosarcoma.
The Scout Out Canine Hemangiosarcoma study , or SOCH, seeks to determine if Calviri's pre-made vaccine can extend the life of dogs with stage 1 or stage 2 tumors when combined with standard care therapy which includes surgery and chemotherapy. HSA is rare in humans but common in dogs, especially in golden retrievers. The cancer originates in the spleen and can spread to other sites.
It is typically detected at later stages, but even when identified early, the life expectancy is between 5 and 11 months. The standard treatment involves surgically removing the tumorous spleen and administering chemotherapy. While personalized cancer vaccines are showing promise for people when used with checkpoint inhibitor immunotherapy (e.
g., Keytruda), those vaccines, which are tailored to individual mutations in tumor DNA, may be impractical to build and be prohibitively expensive for use in dogs. Calviri has identified a different source of neoantigens created from tumor RNA.