Bowel cancer is very common type of cancer. It affects 42,900 people in the UK every year. It mostly affects older people. But recently the number of this cancer cases is continuously increasing among people under the age of 50. It is a very dangerous cancer and needs early diagnosis and proper treatment. But some subtypes of this cancer are very difficult to diagnose and increase the risk of death. A recent study conducted by the reearchers from UCL has revealed that an immunotherapy known as pembrolizumab treats people with bowel cancer effectively. It worked very effectively and treated patients with high-risk bowel cancer. Â
This study was recently presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology. In this study, researchers involved 32 patients with stage 2 and 3 bowel cancer. Then researchers gave these patients pembrolizumab 9 months before they underwent surgery. Previously they used to perform chemotherapy after surgery. They mainly wanted to check whether giving pembrolizumab can reduce the risk of death for those with high-risk bowel cancer. Â
When researchers observed the collected data, they found that more than 50% of the patients who took pembrolizumab were healthy after surgery. They did not even get any symptoms of cancer after surgery. This is very important as only 4% of people who underwent chemotherapy after surgery got well and the remaining died after a certain point. Researchers also found that patients who participated in this study did not get cancer again for a long time. They did not even need any further treatment after they underwent surgery. This reduced the risk of other health complications and serious side effects. Researchers also decided to follow these patients to know how many of them will get cancer again after some time. Â
One of the researchers said that pembrolizumab works very effectively. It can be used as a safe treatment for bowel cancer. This treatment can effectively treat this cancer earlier. So, healthcare professionals should use this treatment and make some effective strategies to save many lives. Â
