Kevin Begins Treatment with an Experimental Melanoma Vaccine

We at Vaxco Pharmaceuticals are excited to announce that we have commenced treatment with our vaccine against metastatic melanoma on a patient who has been fighting his disease now for eight years. To provide a support system for the patient and to keep the public informed we are maintaining this blog with updates regarding his progress and his experiences fighting melanoma. Kevin agreed to share his journey through this blog and through regular video interviews conducted internally here at Vaxco. Along with updating the blog, we hope to post clips from these interviews giving Kevin and his family a variety of avenues to share their story.

Kevin was diagnosed with melanoma on April 28^th, 2000 when he was only 24 years old. It was only three days later, on the first of March, that he underwent the first of many surgeries and began his battle with melanoma. Fighting his cancer with a multidisciplinary treatment of surgery and chemotherapy, including an intensive treatment with a drug called interferon, Kevin’s battle with cancer lead him on a long and difficult journey. Most recently Kevin, now 31 years old, began developing tumors sporadically just beneath his skin. After surgical resection of some of these tumors, Kevin again endured another regimen of chemotherapy only to find new tumors were rapidly continuing to develop. It was at this point that Dr. Raj Sadasivan, Kevin’s Oncologist, decided Kevin was failing conventional treatment options and suggested he take a less conventional route. This is Kevin’s story.

After Kevin stopped responding to conventional treatments, an alternative treatment plan had to be developed. It was suggested Kevin undergo experimental treatments with a new vaccine therapy that had been under development for twelve years, but had never been used on a human patient. Kevin and his family were at this point pressed with a very difficult decision. When alternative and experimental treatments are used, the outcomes are not fully understood. So, do they risk dealing with the unknown side effects of an experimental drug that may prove to have little or no benefit? If you are a member of Kevin’s family you do. It is not in their character to passively deal with anybody or anything, let alone Kevin’s life.  Their bravery, love, and courage showed through in this difficult time.

On March 17^th, 2008 Kevin became the first human to be treated with HCI001, a cancer vaccine developed by Dr. Raj Sadasivan. HCI001 is currently going through the application process to be approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for clinical trials, but at this point HCI001 can only be used on a case by case, compassionate use basis. Approval for compassionate use is an avenue by which the FDA gives dying patients with serious illnesses access to experimental drugs that are in the vast pipelines of the pharmaceutical industry. In lab testing and mouse models the vaccine proved to be effective, but it is still unclear the way the vaccine will affect cancerous melanoma cells in the human body or the human body itself.

Kevin’s first injection was received in his right upper-arm, and was administered at Hope Cancer Institute in Kansas City, KS. After all the excitement, nerves and uncertainty leading up to this moment, the first treatment was relatively uneventful. Other than the typical pain associated with an injection in his deltoid muscle, there were no immediately apparent adverse effects. When Kevin returned the following Wednesday, March 19^th, he received a second injection, this time in his right deltoid. At the time of the second treatment, side effects were still unapparent, until Friday night March 21^st. Kevin’s left elbow began to ache with a deep joint pain escalating to a point that Kevin had a difficult time moving his arm, and to Kevin’s chagrin, his family convinced him to contact Dr. Sadasivan for help.  The pain subsided by the beginning of the week and he did experience similar pain in his right elbow on Monday, but this time the pain was much more tolerable. In his left elbow, the severity of pain was associated with his first treatment.  A unique characteristic of the first treatment, Kevin recieved three different injections. The vaccine is actually mixed with an adjuvant, or a substance that enhances the effect of the vaccine, and this particular adjuvant is known to cause joint pain. For the initial treatment, one shot each of the vaccine and adjuvant were given in their pure form, and another shot was given with the vaccine-adjuvant solution. By using three separate injections, the staff at Hope Cancer Institute was able to monitor distinct reactions to the individual parts of the vaccine. Within the combination of these three injections given at the first treatment, Kevin received a double dose of adjuvant in his left deltoid which was responsible for the intensity  of the pain in his left elbow.  

At the end of his first round of treatment, two weeks and six injections, Kevin is feeling “really well.” He is feeling well enough, in fact, to go back to work fulltime until he begins his second round of treatment in two weeks. The joint pain is no longer a problem, but Kevin did experience a mild skin irritation around the injection sites which has also begun to wane.  Kevin says he would rather have some elbow pain and a rash than feel sick and exhausted from chemotherapy. As far as his progress with the treatment, he has had no new development of tumors and the tumors that were present at the onset of treatment are beginning to harden. These changes and his constantly improving quality of life have given Kevin and his family a certain amount of hope that this treatment may have benefit.