Pembrolizumab Shows Promise As Skin Cancer Drug

Pembrolizumab, which is a skin cancer drug produced by Merck, has already shown marked success at treating patients with melanoma, which is the most dangerous form of skin cancer. An early stage trial of the drug has medical professionals calling it a possible “paradigm shift” in cancer therapy.

Pembrolizumab is an immunotherapy, which is a new form of treatment that companies like Merck and Bristol-Myers are working to bring to the market. Immunotherapies use the body’s own immune system to fight against cancer through the manipulation of certain proteins. Unlike traditional cancer treatments, which cancer cells gain immunity to over time, immunotherapies are able to provide patients with long lasting protection. Antibodies inside patients gain recognition of cancer cells after treatment, which prevents the spread of the cancer, and later on, prevents remission.

In the case of Pembrolizumab, an anti-PD-1 antibody, the drug’s early stage trial saw 69 percent of its 411 enrollees alive after one year of treatment. Doctors have considered this a major leap forward in melanoma treatment because current survival rates for those with advanced stage-four melanoma are quite low – only 10 percent for men and 35 percent for women.

Dr. David Chao, who works at the Royal Free Hampstead NHS trust in London, commented on the promise of the drug in a recent article of The Guardian. “Cancers adapt to treatments, and when they come back they are harder to treat. Can we dream about actually curing some of our patients with very advanced cancer? Once we get the immune system attacking the cancer, can it act independently to keep the cancer under control? We don't have all the answers yet, but that's what we are looking at.”

Researchers found that after 18 months, 62 percent of patients were still living and undergoing treatments. Almost 80 percent of all patients responded to the drug, and 72 percent of patients saw their tumors shrink.

The drug’s manufacturer, Merck Sharp and Dohm, is expected to apply for a European marketing license for the drug in the coming months.