Cancer Immunotherapy

Abstract

Cancer immunotherapy has become a powerful clinical strategy as well as an established pillar for the treatment of cancers to improving the prognosis of many cancer patients with a broad variety of solid tumors as well as blood cancers. The primary goals of immunotherapy are (a) to increase anti-tumor response, (b) decrease the immune suppression, and (c) to enhance the immunogenicity of tumors. This chapter aims to discuss the mechanism and different types of immunotherapies used for different cancers. It will also focus on recombinant products including immunostimulants, immunotoxins, antibodies, fusion proteins, engineered cytotoxic T cells, engineered immunocytokines, vaccines, checkpoint inhibitors, CAR T-cell therapy, and nanomedicine. Although immunotherapy has a rare side effect, it is not fully understood. The development of new strategies has been on the clinical trial to enhance the benefit of cancer patients to meet with challenges of limited efficacy and/or toxicity.