15
The Cancer Warrior Unleashed
2011
Rising stars Drs.
Marcus Butler
and Naoto
Hirano are
recruited from
the U.S. for the
immunotherapy
program.
2009
Immune Therapy
Program is
launched at
Princess Margaret
Cancer Centre.
2013
First adoptive
T-cell therapy
clinical trial opens
in Canada at The
Princess Margaret.
2015
Clinical leadership
is expanded with
Dr. Lillian Siu joining
the immunotherapy
program.
2016
Over 180 active
immunotherapy
clinical trials are
underway at The
Princess Margaret,
including Canada’s
first gene-engineered
T-cell trial.
Unleashing the
Immune System
The immune system has to be able to take on
invaders without damaging normal tissue. To
do that, it must turn off or limit its attack at key
points – scientists call these immune checkpoints.
A type of immunotherapy called immune
checkpoint blockade uses drugs to get the
immune system to ignore the stop signals at these
checkpoints. Conceptually, we think about this as
releasing the brakes on the immune system.
Immune checkpoint blockade has shown
impressive results when tested against certain
cancers.
Currently, there are many studies taking
place at The Princess Margaret that are focused
on improving our understanding of immune
checkpoint blockades for multiple types of cancer.
immune CHECKPOINT BLOCKADE
Immunotherapy at The Princess Margaret
OF DISCOVERY AND INNOVATION