6 lupus patients effectively cured by a cancer therapy, and doctors say they are ‘blown away’

Blood samples taken from a patient receiving CAR-T immunotherapy. AP Photo/Elaine Thompson A handful of patients in Germany have been functionally cured of lupus. Their doctors used a blood-engineering technique that’s usually reserved for fighting aggressive cancers (CAR-T).

It’s unlikely that such a technique could become widespread for lupus-sufferers, because of the cost and lab work required for each patient. Doctors in Germany have found a way to effectively cure the most common form of lupus using a novel and pricey blood-infusion technique typically reserved for treating cancer.  A group of immunologists based in Erlangen, Germany announced in the journal Nature Medicine on Thursday that all five systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) patients who they treated with CAR-T cells during an investigational, compassionate use trial were in remission by three months after their treatment, and remained so for at least eight months longer.

  The find, though still preliminary, suggests that the CAR-T method, which was developed to treat cancer patients using their own blood, could have a miraculous impact on this inflammatory, autoimmune disease that affects more than 200,000 Americans — if only it wasn’t so expensive and labor-intensive.  Lead researcher Georg Schett told STAT that the treatment outcomes were “miraculous,” and the fact that such a therapy course could be used so effectively to combat lupus “blew us away. “”We were really surprised how effective it was,” he said.

 His latest work builds on an initial research letter that Schett and his colleagues published last year in the New England Journal of Medicine, detailing how one other 20-year-old woman was functionally cured of lupus in the same way.  In CAR-T, a patient’s blood is trained to fight disease  CAR-T immunotherapy is usually reserved for treating aggressive cancers like lymphomas, and can cost around $450,000, according to the National Cancer Institute. Part of the reason the treatment is so expensive is because it is highly bespoke, specific to each patient and their disease.

First, blood is extracted from the patient, then it is taken to a lab to have the immune-fighting T cells inside re-engineered with special proteins called chimeric antigen receptors (CARs). Finally, those protein-infused T cells are re-injected into the patient, where they work to kill a target disease (for lupus, the T cells were engineered to fight back against CD19. ) Remarkably, these five lupus patients’ immune systems remained robust during their CAR-T therapy, with no serious infections or toxic side effects reported.

That’s unlike what can happen in cancer patients given CAR-T, who may develop neurological issues, or life-threatening cytokine storms. “This would seem to be the holy grail of treatment,” Dr. Mark Leick, who was not involved in this lupus study, but who works on CAR-T therapies Massachusetts General Hospital, told STAT.

The patients are back to riding horses, dancing, and studyingSchett said one of his young patients is riding horses again, another is DJing in clubs, and a third has resumed her studies — activities they all had to largely forgo when they had lupus, as a result of chronic, debilitating fatigue. For now, CAR-T remains a highly investigational, pricey, experimental fix for just a lucky few lupus sufferers. The typical recommended treatments for hundreds of thousands of other people with lupus around the world without access to these kinds of special blood-engineering programs is still typically limited to steroids and anti-inflammatories like ibuprofen to ease symptoms, or, in the most serious cases, immuno-suppressive drugs.

 Read the original article on Insider.