Biological Therapy Department

The Biotherapy Department of Tianjin Medical University Cancer Hospital was founded in 1972. It is one of the earliest medical units in China to carry out tumor biotherapy. In 2006, the Clinical Application Professional Committee of the China Medical Biotechnology Association was established here, and it is now the clinical research base of the China Medical Biotechnology Association.

The Biotherapy Department is divided into two parts: the Biotherapy Department and the Biotechnology Research Laboratory. It is a special department that closely integrates clinical and basic research.

The Department of Biotherapy currently has more than 100 beds and 17 general practitioners, including 3 chief physicians (including 1 specially appointed expert), 4 deputy chief physicians, 1 doctoral supervisor, and 3 master supervisors.

The treatment methods of the department organically integrate chemotherapy and radiotherapy on the basis of highlighting biological treatment, and gradually form a treatment strategy with its own style.

The department continues to innovate in research and applications such as stem cell therapy (autologous and allogeneic), tumor DC vaccine therapy, and adoptive immune cell therapy.

In the early 1990s, he presided over the successful transhepatic artery infusion of LAK cells derived from autologous spleen cells to treat liver cancer, and since then he has entered the stage of modern tumor biological therapy research.

The blood cell collection instrument - CS-3000 was introduced and a GMP laboratory was established. After acceptance by the Ministry of Health, it was designated as an application unit for autologous LAK cell treatment of solid tumors. It has achieved good therapeutic effects in kidney cancer, melanoma, gastrointestinal tract and liver cancer. In particular, it can significantly improve the quality of life of patients, extend their survival period, and even enable some advanced patients to achieve long-term survival.

Following LAK cells, the department has successively carried out adoptive cell immunotherapy projects such as CIK cells, DC+CIK, R-CIK, and NK.

The department started research on CIK cell therapy in 2000, established a complete technical system for CIK cell preparation, clinical treatment and immune efficacy testing, and also explored the tumor-suppressing mechanism of CIK cells.

In 2006, the CIK cell therapy project was approved by the State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA) to enter clinical trials. It has achieved relatively ideal therapeutic effects in the treatment of lung cancer, kidney cancer and digestive tract tumors and has been used in clinical treatment.

For example, a total of 105 lung cancer patients received CIK treatment combined with chemotherapy from 2006 to 2009, and a total of 19 patients were lost to follow-up until March 2010.

Among all 96 evaluable lung cancer cases, 26 were early-stage cases, OS ranged from 1 to 79 months, and the median survival time was 48.5 months.

Through univariate analysis, it was found that the number of CIK treatments had a significant impact on patients' OS.

The median survival time of patients with more than three CIK treatments (20 cases) was significantly longer than that of those with three or less treatments (6 cases).

There were 70 advanced cases, OS ranged from 1 to 64 months, and median survival time was 11.5 months.

Compared with the median survival time of 7.9 months in 1594 patients with advanced lung cancer treated with conventional chemotherapy regimens reported by ECOG, the median survival time of patients receiving CIK treatment was extended by 3.6 months. The more times CIK treatment is performed, the better the effect.

The Department of Biotherapy initiated the establishment of the China Cancer Immunotherapy Collaborative Group, which provides solid evidence-based medical evidence for the clinical application of tumor immunotherapy by designing and conducting multi-center clinical trials in the field of tumor immunotherapy approved or commissioned by relevant administrative departments, and promotes the standardization and healthy and orderly development of the clinical application of tumor immunotherapy in my country.

The prospective, randomized, open, multi-center clinical study of autologous cytokine-induced killer cells (CIK) combined with chemotherapy for the treatment of lung squamous cell carcinoma initiated by the Department of Biotherapy was funded by the National Science and Technology Support Program.

In addition, the department also carries out autologous inactivated tumor vaccine combined with GM-CSF active immunotherapy.

This project uses its own inactivated tumor cells as tumor antigens, combined with GM-CSF as an adjuvant, to prepare tumor vaccines and stimulate specific anti-tumor immune responses in patients.

The project has applied for technical approval from the Ministry of Health and passed expert review.

We carry out research on new biotherapy technologies such as dendritic cell (DC) vaccines, activated allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell therapy, and NK cell therapy, which have improved the quality of life for tumor patients. We are in a leading position in the country in terms of adoptive immunotherapy and vaccine therapy for malignant solid tumors, and have successively held national biotherapy conferences and biotechnology continuing education training courses.

In 2010, the department participated in the "Research on Technical Standards Related to Immunotherapy and Somatic Cell Therapy" organized by the Ministry of Health and conducted clinical application research on DC vaccines.

In addition, the department has successively carried out international and domestic multi-center clinical trials of multi-target drugs sunitinib, axitinib, pazopanib and anlotinib for the treatment of advanced renal cancer;

He has participated in a number of domestic and foreign clinical trials of CTLA-4 antibodies and PD-1 antibodies, and has accumulated rich experience in tumor immunotherapy and targeted therapy.

The department has won honorary titles such as the school-level Worker Pioneer Award and the college-level Youth Civilization Award, and has won the college-level Outstanding Department Award for three consecutive years.

In the past five years, it has received more than 20 projects from the National Science and Technology Support Plan, the National Science and Technology Research Plan, the National 973 Special Project, the National 863 Special Project, the National Natural Science Foundation, and Tianjin Municipal Science and Technology Commission key projects. It has published nearly 100 papers included in SCI and obtained 1 patent authorization.

It has trained more than 30 master's/doctoral students and international students in total, cultivating and delivering a group of innovative talents to my country's medical field.

He is the editor-in-chief of "Cellular Immunotherapy of Solid Tumors" and co-editor of many oncology monographs such as "Abdominal Oncology", "Concise Oncology", "Head and Neck Oncology", and "New Advances in Oncology".

The Department of Biotherapy has established close cooperation and exchanges with many well-known foreign research institutions, such as Nippon Takara Bio Co., Ltd.

It trains 7-8 doctoral and master's students every year, and many young doctors in the department have experience of studying abroad.