Overview of Immunotherapy
Immunotherapy is a type of cancer treatment that uses elements from the immune system or boosts the body’s own immune system so that it works harder and smarter to attack and remove cancer cells. Immunotherapy may be given at the same time as another cancer treatment or it may be used alone. Currently, immunotherapy works better for some types of cancer than others.
Several types of cancer immunotherapies are now used, including:
Different immunotherapies cause different side effects; some may be mild but others can be quite severe. One concern with all immunotherapy treatments is that these drugs might allow the immune system to attack some normal cells in the body, sometimes causing serious side effects. Immunotherapy treatments may be delayed or permanently discontinued if certain serious side effects develop.
Updated 12/26/2017
