SANTIAGO, Chile — A team of Chilean scientists has taken a significant step in the fight against one of the deadliest forms of skin cancer, after the first results in humans of the therapeutic vaccine TRIMELVax showed encouraging signs against advanced melanoma. The development, led by biotechnology company Oncobiomed in partnership with the University of Chile, offers new hope for patients who no longer respond to standard treatments.
The Phase I clinical trial, published in the scientific journal British Journal of Cancer, enrolled 17 patients with metastatic melanoma treated at Hospital del Salvador in Santiago. All of them had seen their disease progress despite receiving first-line immunotherapy, a scenario the researchers themselves describe as leaving few remaining treatment options.
