There are different types of immunotherapy including anti-body therapy, cytokine therapy, checkpoint inhibitors and adoptive cell therapy (such as CAR T-cell therapy). Immunotherapy is only suitable for certain types of cancer.
One example is rituximab (Mabthera®) – a treatment used to treat some types of lymphoma. It attaches itself to a particular protein on the cancer cell and triggers the body’s own immune system to attack and destroy the cancer cells.
Because immunotherapy drugs target specific cells, the treatment does not damage other cells in the body. However, there may still be side effects.
There are new immunotherapy treatments being developed and trials being run to find new, more effective treatment options.
What are the seven main types of cancer immunotherapy?
Did you know there are seven main types of immunotherapy? Let's find out what they do and how they work...
Taking part in clinical trials
Many children and young people with cancer are treated on clinical trials. A clinical trial is a medical research study involving people and there are many different types of clinical trial which are essential to developing new methods to prevent, detect…