Wall Diver

Dendreon Troubles Beyond Provenge Test

Hmmm....you're a 60-year old man whose hormone treatments for prostate cancer have stopped working to slow the spread of the cancer, and its metastasizing to your bones...specifically, to your pelvis. You're starting to feel pain. You know that without any treatment, your future is one of severe pain, when the metastases rip your pelvis apart. Your choice is between seven months of Taxotere chemotherapy plus prednisone, or doing nothing. One course of Tax every three weeks for seven months. Your hair and nails will fall out, your white blood cell count will drop, leaving you vulnerable to infection, and you'll probably need anti-nausea medication. There's probably a 50-50 chance Tax's side effects will be so severe that you'll need to be hospitalized. Perhaps a 5-10% chance that Taxotere kills you outright. The Taxotere itself will cost perhaps ~$35K for a full seven-month regimen. Then you have to factor in the cost of the anti-nausea medication, the frequent use of prednisone, and the cost of your hospitalizations. Then, you must factor in the horrible way you're going to feel both during and after the Tax treatment--nausea, exhaustion, and a general feeling of malaise. You decide to decline Taxotere chemotherapy, just as 50% of all men with AIPC do.

Oh wait, now Provenge is approved! Now, you can sit down for an hour in the doctor's office a few times over a four-week period. Your blood gets drawn, and your dendritic cells will be reinfused into your blood, along with the immune booster CM-GSF plus the PAP antigen. Your immune system will be on the alert for any cells with PAP on them, and will be trained by these reinfused elements to be on the lookout for any cells with PAP that are already in your body too (PAP is only found on prostate cancer cells). After the infusions, you'll probably have a low-grade fever and chills for about a day. If you're unlucky, the fever will rise to the 102F range. A couple days after the treatment, you can go play golf. Your urologist has seen the trial results, and he knows that your chance of surviving for three more years after Provenge treatment is about five times higher than if you didn't receive Provenge or Taxotere. Hmmm....what should you do?