In the US, a team of scientists saved a woman from fatal multiple myeloma - an incurable cancer of the bone marrow - by infecting her with a high dose of the measles virus..

Within 6 months, the patient completely got rid of live tumor cells..

Two patients received a large intravenous dose of the measles virus, which was modified by scientists to kill myeloma cells without damaging healthy cells in the body..

A research team at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, says both patients responded to treatment with fewer cancer cells and lower levels of a myeloma marker protein..

But at the same time, one patient, a 49-year-old woman, achieved complete remission and completely got rid of live cancer cells during 6 months of follow-up..

A report on this unique treatment was published by Rochester researchers in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings e-Journal..

Virotherapy is effective in disseminated cancer.

Study lead author Dr. Stephen Russell, hematologist and co-inventor of the new treatment, said: “This is the first study to prove the usefulness of oncolytic virotherapy for advanced cancer.. Our patients did not respond to other therapies and experienced constant flare-ups of the disease.”.

The new method is an example of so-called oncolytic virotherapy, the use of a genetically modified virus to kill cancer, which dates back to the 1950s.. Thousands of patients have been treated with oncolytic viruses over the years; scientists used viruses from different families, including the common cold, herpes, and chickenpox.

But the authors of this study, for the first time in history, documented a case in which a patient with disseminated cancer achieved a complete remission after treatment with an oncolytic virus..

Myeloma is a type of cancer that develops from plasma cells in the bone marrow.. According to the American Cancer Society, this disease is relatively rare, and only 1 in 149 people develop myeloma in the United States.. Occurs mostly after 40-50 years.

Myeloma can occur in any part of the body where there is bone marrow, including the spine, chest, and pelvis.. Multiple myeloma means the cancer has started in more than one place at once..

This disease initially responds to treatment with drugs that stimulate the immune system, but multiple myeloma is rarely completely cured..

First use of a high dose of measles virus.

Dr. Russelli and colleagues in their article write that they chose these two cases for reporting because they were the first patients in history to receive the highest tolerable dose of the virus.. They had not come into contact with this pathogen before, so they did not have antibodies to it.. In addition, these patients were unsuccessfully treated by all available methods..

Study lead author Dr. Angela Dispenzieri, an expert on multiple myeloma, put it into words that the measles virus causes myeloma cells to stick together and rupture..

She says that there is another beneficial effect associated with such treatment: "

With the completion of the phase I clinical trial and proof of concept, scientists are rapidly preparing for a phase II clinical trial that will include more patients.

They also intend to test the effectiveness of the virus in other types of cancer, including head and neck tumors, brain cancer, ovarian cancer and mesothelioma.. To do this, the team is developing modified viruses that can kill cells of various tumors..

Dr. Russell says they recently started thinking about creating a "

Mayo Clinic has declared its financial interest in the methods that were used by the researchers. Dr.

Russell's work was funded by the National Cancer Institute, Albert and Mary McQuinn, the Harold Siebens Foundation, and the Richard Schulze Family Foundation..

Nature Genetics recently published an article about how the Institute for Cancer Research in the UK found a gene involved in the aging process and associated with the occurrence of multiple myeloma.. The team says this is the seventh gene that has been linked to myeloma and could hold the key to understanding the disease..

medbe. en.