A chance to improve the quality of life for patients with pancreatic cancer

Pancreatic cancer is one of the cancers with the highest mortality - the 5-year survival rate in Poland is only 6-7%, and only 25% survive a year after diagnosis. sick. These statistics have not changed for years due to the difficulties in diagnosing cancer in its early stages and resistance to chemotherapy.

One of the projects in this area that received funding from the Medical Research Agency is a clinical trial conducted by the Medical University of Silesian Piasts in Wrocław. In the project entitled: Impact of irreversible calcium electroporation, electrochemotherapy and electroporation (IRE-CaCl2, ECT and IRE) on the quality of life and progression-free survival in patients with pancreatic cancer, a team of researchers led by prof. dr hab. Wojciech Kielan is working on an innovative method of treating pancreatic cancer consisting in destabilizing the cell membrane of the cancer cell and increasing its permeability to drugs (chemotherapeutics or calcium ions).

- The interest in the study is very high. So far, we have included 26 patients in the project and assigned them to one of three groups: the group with electroporation alone, with calcium electroporation or with electrochemotherapy with bleomycin. Samples are taken from patients for immunological tests. An operation is performed. The patient is hospitalized for 6 days at the Clinic, during which the safety of the procedure is tested - explains Prof. dr hab. Wojciech Kielan.

Checks take place one month, three months, six months and a year after the procedure. They consist in examining the patient, laboratory tests, taking samples for immunological tests and performing computed tomography with the assessment of progression, regression or stabilization of the change.

- We expect an answer to the question: does electroporation, calcium electroporation or electrochemotherapy with bleomycin prolong progression-free survival or improve patients' quality of life. We will check if the procedure is safe. We want to determine overall survival and immune system response as secondary goals. We also want to answer the questions of whether any of the methods is more effective and what is the best time to qualify for the procedure - explains dr n.med. Julia Rudno-Rudzińska, co-author of the study.

It is an innovative method that combines a non-pharmacological method, which is electroporation, with a new application of calcium ions, in addition to the characteristics of the drug, in anticancer therapy both in patients diagnosed "de novo" and for patients for whom standard treatment methods do not work. The combination of electroporation with intravenous administration of bleomycin in the correct dose is also innovative, which creates a new therapeutic method, which is electrochemotherapy.

Source: ABM