For someone with cancer, being lucky enough to get past the 5-year mark is a success, and being lucky enough to get past the 10-year mark is a miracle. Emily, as the world's first leukemia child patient who successfully received CAR-T therapy, has been successfully free of cancer for 11 years.
①CAR-T cell therapy (timeline of Emily Whitehead's treatment case)
Emily was born on May 2, 2005, when she had thick hair and weighed 10 pounds. She has been lively, lovely and full of creativity since she was a child. She especially likes handicrafts and painting.
In May 2010, Emily was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia after being diagnosed at the Hush Medical Center in the United States.
In October 2011, after more than a year of battling acute lymphoblastic leukemia, Emily, who was only 6 years old, had undergone multiple treatments without success. The doctor told her parents that they had no choice but to suggest that she should go home to rest. Nevertheless, Emily's parents did not give up hope. They pinned their last hope on CAR-T cell therapy, hoping that this innovative therapy could bring her miracles.
In March 2012, Emily participated in the recruitment of Novartis clinical trials.
Phase I clinical trial of CAR-T cell immunotherapy at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia in April 2012. In the clinical trial, doctors collected Emily's T cells from her blood and reprogrammed them in the lab to recognize and attach to a protein called CD19, which is found only in B On the cell surface, the redesigned cells are called chimeric antigen receptor T cells. These remodeled cells were injected into Emily's body and dispersed throughout the body to find and kill cancer cells.
In May 2012, Emily found that her leukemia condition had improved, thanks to the key role of CAR-T cell immunotherapy.
In June 2012, Emily finally successfully defeated leukemia and was officially discharged from the hospital.
In May 2023, Emily has lived cancer-free for 11 years, and her treatment experience has also been filmed into a documentary "Medicine and Miracles-" Medicine and Miracles"
② Principle of CAR-T cell therapy technology
CAR-T therapy is derived from the abbreviation of Chimeric antigen receptor T cell in English, which means chimeric antigen receptor T cells. This technology introduces specific antigen receptors into normal T cells so that they can specifically bind to target cancer cells and kill them through cell killing. In clinical application, CAR-T therapy first collects T cells from the peripheral blood of patients, then stimulates and expands them in vitro, and transduces specific CAR genes through viral vectors to form CAR-T cells. Finally, these modified CAR-T cells are infused back into the patient to play their role in killing cancer cells. Therefore, CAR-T cell therapy also refers to the application of this technology.
③Market pipeline analysis of CAR-T therapeutic products
A research report published online in The Lancet in September 2022 showed that among all cancers, Chinese children and adolescents had the highest overall incidence of leukemia at 39.34/million. development index) increases.
According to the query of "Drug Rongyun Database", there are currently as many as 548 companies involved in the field of CAR-T therapy in the world, with 1,179 varieties under research, involving 180 indications and 232 targets.
Screenshot Source: Yaorong Cloud Database
CAR-T global R&D pipeline: 8 approved products for marketing, 3 applications for marketing, 5 for phase III clinical trials, 175 for phase II clinical trials, 209 for phase I clinical trials, 30 for clinical trials, 12 for clinical trials, and 424 for preclinical trials , Drug Discovery 120.
CAR-T R&D pipeline in China: 2 approved products for marketing, 4 applications for marketing, 3 for phase III clinical trials, 102 for phase II clinical trials, 139 for phase I clinical trials, 26 for clinical trials, 12 for clinical trials, and 128 for preclinical trials , 27 drug discovery.
Analysis of the number of CAR-T (China) R&D companies: the current top ten products in the field of CAR-T in China are
Shenzhen Institute of Immunogene Therapy, Gracell Biotech, Shanghai Stans Biotech, Keji Biomedicine (Shanghai), Guangzhou Baiji Gene Technology, Nanjing Reindeer Medical Technology, Nanjing Legend Biotechnology, Shanghai Youkadi Biomedicine, Zhejiang University, Origincell Therapeutics.
Screenshot Source: Yaorong Cloud Database
Analysis of CAR-T (global) research and development indications: The top ten CAR-T products under research involving the most targets are hematopoietic or lymphoid tissue tumors, malignant tumors, blood or hematopoietic organ diseases, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, Solid tumors, B-cell lymphoma, multiple myeloma, lymphoid leukemia, malignant, acute B-lymphoblastic leukemia, acute myelogenous leukemia.
Screenshot Source: Yaorong Cloud Database
Detailed list of CAR-T therapy approved products: The 8 drugs that will be launched globally by May 2023 are Achilles (launched in China), Rigi Orense (China), brexucabtagene autoleucel, brexucabtagene autoleucel, isagenlecleucel, tisagenlecleucel, Cedar Giorunza, ARI-0001.
Screenshot Source: Yaorong Cloud Database
④Analysis of the future market prospect of CAR-T therapy products
The following figure shows the sales data of Novartis tisagenlecleucel from 2017 to 2021 in the "Yaorong Cloud-Global Drug Sales Database" as an example. It can be seen that the CAR-T product is on the rise year by year.
Screenshot Source: Yaorong Cloud Database
Up to now, CAR-T therapy has made major breakthroughs in a variety of hematological tumors, and researchers around the world are working hard day and night. It is believed that scientists will have more breakthroughs in new research on CAR-T, new Experiments, new methods.