While I wish this research well, very well in fact…
In 8 of 16 patients studied, the vaccines activated T cells that recognize the patient’s own pancreatic cancers. These patients also showed delayed recurrence of their pancreatic cancers, suggesting the T cells activated by the vaccines may be having the desired effect to keep pancreatic cancers in check.
This is a far cry from “stops pancreatic cancer”. An article about research science by the research scientist leading it is a call for funding. It is very probably a good thing to fund. But misleading headlines set society up for disappointment when the science doesn’t deliver on the headline claims. This weakens public trust in science. A huge part of this problem is the need for science to beg for grants and funding in the first place.
Going to lose a family friend to pancreatic cancer in a few months. The life expectancy after symptoms is like 6months. It’s brutally fast.
The problem is the speed. This research might not “stop” this form of cancer, but if it opens up roads to makes it more detectable? So we can get to it earlier to treat it or manage it. I’ll take that.
Maybe we can move that number from 6 months life expectancy to something that would give some more time. Maybe we could stop it all together. Whatever it is, all information is useful in the fight. I just hope we get some mileage out of this soon before it takes more loved ones.
My dad was given two years to live.
In his third year, he made an Elkhorn cane for me.
He died after four years of fighting.
No matter what, the hospital did everything medical science could do. At the time. Even now, due to his circumstances, he wouldnt have had much more time. If he took medical marijuana, MAYBE it could have bought him another two years. Maybe it would have made his last two years pain free. But that’s it. It was too far advanced by the time they found the cancer.
Maybe if it was found sooner, but he refused the proper treatments that would have found it sooner.
Maybe if medical science was more advanced, but the hospital he went to is still active and highly regarded as one of the most effective and trusted resources for cancer treatment. He got the best medical treatment possible at the time, and the doctors already pushed the treatments to their theoretical limits.
Maybe. Maybe. Maybe.
But he did change. I never saw him get weaker or waste away. He always seemed so strong. He became kinder and in the end left me with only happy kind memories. I know he was still abusive when I was younger. But he looked at the time he had and decided he wanted to use those two years to be a better father. To give us memories of a man who wanted to be a better person.
When he survived that second year, we all assumed he was going to win. He didn’t. He knew he was still dying and so he spent every day as if he wasn’t going to survive. Made arrangements, spent time with us. Said goodbye in his own way. Found his peace. Everyone thought the Elkhorn cane was for him. I was the only one who helped him make it. When he died, the cane was his for only about half a year. Maybe a year and a half at most. It’s been almost two decades since then.
I still see it as his cane. The oils from my hands have worn parts to a shine. My own hands have smoothed the Elkhorn down. It has been mine for decades,for years longer then it has ever been his.
But this thing? This cane? My father made it for me. He left symbols on it. Little marks that no one else would have noticed. It connects me to him, and through him, to my tribe. It’s his cane but it’s mine. It’s a show of his determination to be a better father. Running out of time, but still trying to be a better father then he was the day before. His final message to me about this cane, was “this is not a weapon.”
His final lessons, were to be better. Kinder. He didn’t have time to teach me everything. So he had to leave it to little memories, little details, little reminders. So that even in death, he could lead by example and be an example he wanted me to learn from and follow.
The cane long ago became mine by right. It’s still his by connection.
Maybe medical science could eventually have given him more life. Maybe.
I can’t live my life based off of a maybe though. It was out of our hands. He fought for every day. He died as a better person, then he was when he was first diagnosed. And that’s enough sometimes. Sometimes it’s better then a maybe.
Maybe sometimes I just miss my dad.
Thank you for writing that. It was a joy and a sorrow to read.
I wish you both well, I know it must be very hard, and I really do hope this and other research helps everyone suffering sooner rather than later. I’ll take whatever progress we can get too. I just don’t like the idea of overly bold claims promising too much, when there may be other good leads to follow which go unnoticed as a result.
I also hope this research pans out, but holy crap am I sick of the state of science reporting. For at least the last like 25 years everyone seems to just find a study (any study) with some tenuously promising result under some very specific conditions, and then they write a big ol’ science fiction story about how it’s going to save humanity. Just zero rigor. And about half the time when I’m able to track down the actual study the story is based on, what the study says and what the article says it says aren’t just a little different, often it’s night and day.
At this point I think I’d even treat a headline like, “new research concludes that water can make things wet,” with skepticism.
I don’t know how excited we could be when 8 out of 16 folks had a good response. On the one hand n is so so small. On the other hand, pancreatic cancer is almost impossible to treat!
I’d have given anything to see the person I love have even a 50% chance.
Can’t wait for all the vaccine conspiracy theorists to go out of their way to get pancreatic cancer just to “own the jab”
Seeing as they are specifically tailored to each person and they work to treat those that already have pancreatic cancer… is vaccine the correct term?
Is it a vaccine because it induces a response within the patient that then kills the cancer, whereas something that would be considered a treatment would directly destroy the cancer like anti-biotics do to bacterial infections?
Yeah. It’s the mechanism that defines a vaccine, not when it’s administered.
It trains you own T-cells to recognise the cancer cells, so it’s a vaccine.
A friend’s mom passed away by pancreatic cancer. It was so quick (a few months) and absolutely brutal from what I heard. Hopefully this leads to some good development for a treatment!
Yeah it’s tough, there’s so much gray area and clickbait hype on these “cure” discoveries. Then we learn it’s either too early to know or only impacts a hyper specific subgroup in a limited way. I do think it’s fantastic that science is progressing and that mRNA technology is having massive and broad impact in lots of areas of medicine. The more the public can be educated and understand it’s not voodoo and miracle cures, but hard fought incremental progress, the better.
As with articles like this on Reddit I will reserve my hope.
Big if true.
