BIOLOGICAL THERAPY IN INDIA
What Is Biological Therapy?
Biological therapy is a type of treatment that works with your immune system. It can help fight cancer or help control side effects (how your body reacts to the drugs you are taking) from other cancer treatments like chemotherapy.
Biological therapies are designed to boost the immune system, either directly or indirectly, by assisting in the following:
- Making cancer cells more recognizable by the immune system, and therefore more susceptible to destruction by the immune system
- Boosting the killing power of immune system cells
- Changing the way cancer cells grow, so that they act more like healthy cells
- Stopping the process that changes a normal cell into a cancerous cell
- Enhancing the body’s ability to repair or replace normal cells damaged or destroyed by other forms of cancer treatment, such as chemotherapy or radiation
- Preventing cancer cells from spreading to other parts of the body
What Are Cancer Vaccines?
Cancer vaccines are a form of biological therapy. While other vaccines (like ones for measles or mumps) are given before you get sick, cancer vaccines are given after you have cancer. Cancer vaccines may help your body fight the cancer and keep it from coming back.
Doctors are learning more all the time about cancer vaccines. They are now doing research about how cancer vaccines can help people diagnosed with melanoma, lymphoma, and kidney, breast, ovarian, prostate, colon, and rectal cancers.
How Does Biological Therapy Fight Cancer?
Doctors are not sure how biological therapy helps your immune system fight cancer. But they think it may:
- Stop or slow the growth of cancer cells.
- Make it easier for your immune system to destroy, or get rid of, cancer cells.
- Keep cancer from spreading to other parts of your body.
