The Valencia Clinical Hospital has joined an international clinical study to test an experimental vaccine for melanoma treatment. This innovative therapy has shown efficacy against skin cancer thanks to messenger RNA technology, the same platform used in some COVID-19 vaccines.
Pharmaceutical companies Moderna and Merck (known as MSD outside the United States and Canada) have reported promising preliminary results from the phase III clinical trial INTerpath-001. Although peer-reviewed scientific data has not yet been published, the initial findings offer an encouraging outlook for patients.
The study, which involved 1,137 patients from 26 countries, is based on messenger RNA technology. A key difference is that each vaccine is personally designed based on the unique characteristics of each patient's tumor, unlike common COVID-19 vaccines.
In Spain, other participating healthcare centers include the Vall d'Hebron University Hospital, the Clínic de Barcelona, the Quirón Madrid University Hospital, the Ramón y Cajal University Hospital, and the Regional University Hospital of Malaga.
Dr. Inés González, an oncologist and head of the melanoma area at the Valencia Clinical Hospital and a researcher at Incliva, has highlighted the trial's significance. The experimental therapy, named 'intismeran autogene', is combined with the drug pembrolizumab (Keytruda) in patients who have already undergone surgery to remove melanoma but have a high risk of recurrence.
Dr. González explains that after surgery, the tumor is analyzed to create a personalized vaccine. This technology, part of immunotherapy, is the first time it has demonstrated efficacy in cancer, as treated patients have taken longer to relapse. The effectiveness of RNA vaccines in cancer opens new avenues for future studies in other types of tumors.
Immunotherapy represents a significant shift for the future of melanoma patients, an aggressive cancer that previously had a reduced life expectancy. Now, even metastatic melanomas could potentially be curable.
