Experimental and Clinical Research of Dendritic Cell and Syngeneic Immunotherapy of Brain Glioma

Abstract

Objective: To investigate the clinical effect and prospective use of syngeneic brain glioma antigen dendritic cell (DC) vaccine. Methods: DCs were isolated from peripheral blood of brain glioma patients. DCs loaded with different tumor antigens were cocultured with T lymphocytes. The cytotoxity of T lymphocytes to glioma cells was tested by LDH method. Fifty-six glioma patients were divided into 3 groups treated with different methods. Experimental group (19 cases): syngeneic brain glioma antigen DC vaccine and bacilie calmette guerin (BCG); Positive control group (17 cases): glioma homogenate and BCG; Negative control group (20 cases): only radiotherapy after resection. Therapeutic effect of every group was evaluated. Results: High purity DCs could be harvested by GM-CSF and IL-4 culture. The cytotoxicity of DC was enhanced when loaded with tumor antigen. There were different therapeutic effects among 3 groups. The median survival time in group 1 (38 months) and group 2 (24 months) was significantly longer than that in group 3 (13 months). Conclusion: Syngeneic brain glioma antigen DC vaccine could inhibit the recurrence and progression of glioma. This method can prolong the survival time of brain glioma patients.