Groundbreaking Cancer Immunotherapy Grace Gawler interviews Dr Horst Lindhoffer Munich

On today’s edition of Navigating the Cancer Maze, Grace Gawler interviews Dr Horst Lindhoffer PhD about one of the most innovative and exciting cancer immunotherapy treatment breakthroughs in many years. Visit germancancertreatments.com for more information.

On Navigating the Cancer Maze – Cancer Immunotherapy – Ground-breaking treatment in Cancer Medicine Grace Gawler -August 2, 2013

 “Destroying cancer stem cells means fighting cancer at its roots”, says Horst Lindhofer, CEO of TRION Pharma. “Catumaxomab’s efficacy against this particularly aggressive and resistant population of cancer cells further supports its therapeutic potential for the treatment of EpCAM-positive carcinomas.”

On today’s edition of Navigating the Cancer Maze, I interview Dr Horst Lindhoffer PhD about one of the most innovative and exciting cancer treatment breakthroughs in many years. We know that The human immune system is usually quite effective at identifying and eliminating abnormal cells.

dr horst lindhofer
Dr Horst Lindhofer

 Cancer cells, however, can form tumors and spread throughout the body. Although chaotic in their behavior, cancer cells operate with high level intelligence to escape detection by our immune system’s control mechanisms. Often misunderstood, this is a fundamental principle in understanding how cancer cells behave and how immune recognition can be assisted. The new breakthrough cancer treatments capitalize on that information. It has been a long-standing vision of physicians and scientists to develop a treatment that can put the immune system back on track. TRION has achieved the goal with its trifunctional Triomab® antibodies. Listen to learn more or contact grace@germancancertreatments.com for further details.

Listen to this interview at:
http://www.voiceamerica.com/episode/72038/cancer-immunotherapy-ground-breaking-treatment-in-cancer-medicine
Catumaxomab (Removab®) is presently the only approved therapeutic antibody targeting EpCAM, a surface antigen that is widely expressed in the most frequent forms of human cancer. On April 20th this year, Removab® received EU approval for the intraperitoneal treatment of malignant ascites in patients with EpCAM-positive carcinomas. Removab® is the first product world-wide to receive a regulatory approval for this indication. With its trifunctional mode of action, Removab® represents a new generation of antibodies using the body’s own immune system to help fight the tumor cells.

For more information visit www.germancancertreatments.com Enquiries: To discover more about Horst Lindhoffer’s work with Trifunctional antibodies  – please email grace@germancancertreatments.com

EpCAM: EpCAM or epithelial cell adhesion molecule is a pan-epithelial differentiation antigen that is expressed on almost all carcinomas, such as breast, lung, colorectal, gastric, prostate and ovarian cancer. Catumaxomab (Removab®) is the only approved anti-EpCAM antibody available.

Triomab®: Trifunctional antibodies : Triomab® antibodies bind to cancer-specific surface antigens and recruit both T cells as well as accessory cells, such as macrophages, dendritic cells and natural killer cells, to the tumor site. As a result, they provide for a new quality of cancer cell killing, activating both arms of the immune system – the adaptive one with cytotoxic T cells as effectors and the innate one including accessory effector cells.

dendritic cell image
dendritic cell image

Triomab® antibodies are therefore very effective in destroying cancer cells and show a therapeutic effect at very low doses. Triomab® antibodies are a development of TRION Pharma GmbH Catumaxomab was invented by TRION Pharma and has been developed with Fresenius Biotech.

Trifunctional Antibody Catumaxomab Triggers Vaccination Effect Against Cancer: On June 06, 2011 Munich, Germany TRION Pharma GmbH released and announced new information – the results from two different studies demonstrating catumaxomab’s capacity to activate the immune system in a way that can otherwise only be achieved through vaccination. 

The data was obtained by two independent research teams using catumaxomab in malignant ascites and gastric cancer, respectively. These new results confirm the drug’s unique capacity to trigger several immune response mechanisms at the same time. Catumaxomab not only induces direct tumor cell destruction – as was presented during last year’s ASCO – but also a long-term vaccination effect against the individual tumor.

The results were presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO).

“This vaccination effect could provide a decisive advantage over current mono- or bispecific antibody approaches: Permanent treatment with catumaxomab will not be needed” , says Horst Lindhofer, CEO of TRION Pharma. “If we are next able to align these data with clinical outcome, this offers a paradigm shift in antibody-based cancer therapy: From chronic treatment to short-term application with long-term effects. This would lead to significant benefits, not only for cancer patients, but also for public healthcare systems.” For more information visit www.germancancertreatments.com
Professional and patient Enquiries: Learn more – please email grace@germancancertreatments.com

About Dr Horst  Lindhofer PhD

 Following his PhD thesis at the Ludwig Maximilian’s University, Horst Lindhofer moved to the Helmholtz Zentrum München, where he was initially group leader, then head of a clinical cooperation group with Munich’s University Hospital. During this time, he laid the foundation for the innovative Triomab® approach and initiated the first clinical studies with trifunctional antibodies. Results were highly encouraging and gave impetus to the foundation of TRION in 1998. Since then, he has developed the company into a successful biopharmaceutical enterprise with state-of-the-art product development capabilities and in-house GMP manufacturing facilities. He has published numerous scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals and won several prestigious awards for his ground-breaking work in the field of cancer immunotherapy.