2024-10-22 02:21:00
A combination of cells, viruses and a Trojan horse. It is the bet that a group of researchers from the Niño Jesús hospital in Madrid launched almost twenty years ago and which is about to become reality to cure the most difficult tumors. The Ministry of Health of Madrid has asked the Medicines Agency of the Ministry of Health for authorization for Celyvir, a non-industrial medicine produced by the Madrid health system which is not supported by any pharmaceutical company.
This is the third drug with these characteristics that the Community of Madrid develops as part of its advanced therapies program, as announced by the Director General of Research and Teaching, Inmaculada Ibáñez, during her speech at the III Conference of the Network of Advanced Therapies of the Community of Madrid.
These drugs are special. They are made up of cells from the patients themselves or from other compatible individuals.
The latest arrival, Celyvir, uses mesenchymal stem cells as a vehicle, a sort of biological taxi, to transport a virus designed to selectively eliminate cancer cells without damaging patients’ healthy cells.
Mesenchymal cells are excellent transporters, capable of reaching all malignant cells to deposit the lethal virus. They are because they have the innate ability to migrate to inflamed areas and tumors. But they also have another additional advantage and that is that they know how to hide their weapon from recognition and possible attack by the immune system. Thus they reach the metastases and release the oncolytic virus against the tumor cells, as if it were a Trojan horse.
An advanced treatment plan
Celyvir joins two other compounds that Madrid Healthcare has already contributed to the National System and are designed for non-oncology treatments. This is the case of Alofisel, whose research was born at the La Paz hospital to treat complex perianal fistulas in adult patients suffering from Crohn’s disease. Or NC1 which developed the Puerta de Hierro Majadahonda to recover the sensitivity and motor capacity of patients suffering from multiple sclerosis. The latter was the first approved in Spain for non-industrial production.
Potential immune system
The Community of Madrid has had its own strategy for advanced therapies for six years and a regional plan launched in 2022. Added to the first three ‘live’ drugs, with patient cells, is the development of CAR-T treatments within hospitals . This strategy, also used in cancer, against hematological tumours, consists of using the patient’s T lymphocytes, modifying them in the laboratory to strengthen the body’s defenses and attack the tumor cells.
Catalonia pioneered the use of academic CAR-Ts, without the help of the pharmaceutical industry. But in the last two years Madrid has handled 430 requests to use the procedure. It has seven large national reference centers to administer them, one in four in Spain, located in the public university hospitals Gregorio Marañón, Niño Jesús, 12 de Octubre, La Paz, Ramón y Cajal and La Princesa, in the capital, in addition to the Puerta de Hierro Majadahonda, reports the Community of Madrid.
Researchers from all these complexes work in a network, which allows them to address these treatments in a multidisciplinary way with the integration of actions from all areas to accelerate the process of innovation, optimization of resources, homogenization of therapies and foster opportunities for global projection all its members.
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