Black men with advanced prostate cancer have a greater chance of survival after immunotherapy treatment, at least in part, because of ancestral gene variants in immune responses. That connection is described in a new study by researchers at Duke Cancer Institute and published recently in the journal Cancer Research Communications. Black men are 70% more likely than white men to have prostate cancer and die at higher rates from the disease , according to the American Cancer Society.
For men with metastatic prostate cancer that has progressed despite hormonal therapy, sipuleucel-T (marketed as Provenge) is the only effective and FDA-approved immunotherapy. While this therapy extends life in all such patients, DCI researchers have recently found that Black men have the greatest survival benefit with this therapy. However, the reasons for this have been unclear until now.
"Our team aims to understand what drives response to immune-based cancer therapies," said study co-lead author Smita Nair, Ph.D., a professor in the departments of Neurosurgery, Surgery, and Pathology.
The researchers built on previously reported findings identifying ancestral differences in how certain proteins called toll-like receptors sense pathogens and direct immune responses. This genetic link has been described in other inflammatory contexts, such as fighting infectious diseases caused by viruses or bacteria, but has not been previously linked to cancer or immunotherapy for cancer. The Duke team's findin.
