"A vaccine https for breast https and ovarian cancer https that has spread to other parts of the body shows promise according to a preliminary study of  patients. One woman who got the investigational vaccine https now has no Xray evidence of cancer says study researcher James Gulley MD PhD. In January it will be four years for her he tells WebMD. As exciting as that is he says a lot of work needs to be done to prove whether this can be effective for more patients. Gulley is director and deputy chief of the clinical trials https group at the Laboratory of Tumor Immunology and Biology National Cancer https Institute. Results of the vaccine were not as good in the other  patients. For them the median time before the cancer https progressed was about two months. That time frame is not anything to write home about Gulley says. Overall however the limited success in some patients and the complete success in one is good news he says. It gives us encouragement that we may be on to something here. The study funded by the National Cancer https Institute is published in Clinical Cancer Research. Testing the Vaccine Gulleys team enrolled  patients with breast cancer https and  with ovarian cancer https They ranged in age from  to . The patients had already undergone a variety of treatments but the cancer was progressing. Twenty one of the  had undergone three or more chemotherapy https regimens. The patients received injections of the investigational PANVAC vaccine given monthly until the disease worsened. The vaccine targets two proteins mucin MUC and carcinoembryonic antigen https CEA Gulley says. Both are overexpressed in many cancer cells. The vaccine is designed to have your bodys immune system recognize and attack tumor cells making CEA and MUC Gulley says. The patient with no evidence of cancer had breast cancer https and was the youngest in the study at . The cancer had gone to her liver https and to her lymph nodes in her chest Gulley says. After the vaccine the cancer began to shrink. At  months it was completely gone and remained gone. As far as we can tell there is no radiographic evidence of disease. Among the breast cancer https patients overall however the median time half more half less before the cancer progressed was . months. The median overall survival was . months. Four had stable disease defined as the cancer neither growing nor shrinking. Among the ovarian cancer patients the median time to progression was two months and the median overall survival was  months. Three had stable disease. The followup was up to  months. Side effects were mild Gulley says. Most common was a reaction at the injection site which was temporary. Two patients had musculoskeletal pain. One had anemia https Some got fevers https he says which were relieved with fever reducers. Interpreting the Findings The question is why did we see this result in one patient he says. All we can get from this trial are hints. The woman who remains diseasefree had a previous treatment with a different treatment vaccine. That might have primed her immune system Gulley speculates. She also had only one regimen of chemotherapy perhaps keeping her immune system stronger. Ideally the vaccine may need to be given earlier in the course of the disease he says. Further research should focus on predicting which patients would benefit most. The PANVAC vaccine is one of several cancer vaccines being studied. It is a therapeutic or treatment vaccine given after the disease occurs. Other cancer vaccines being studied are preventive or prophylactic. They are meant to prevent cancer in those who are cancerfree. Much more research is needed on the PANVAC vaccine for breast https and ovarian cancer Gulley says. Its difficult at this point to predict costs. However he expects costs will not approach those for Provenge the pricey treatment vaccine for prostate cancer https approved by the FDA in . Provenge costs  for the onemonth threedose treatment. Medicare https covers it. PANVAC is an offtheshelf vaccine Gulley says. Its been developed at the National Cancer Institute. Its easier to make and logistically much simpler than the prostate cancer https vaccine which requires manipulation of the blood https with each patient. Second Opinion The study results show the promise and the frustration of developing therapeutic vaccines says Vincent K. Tuohy PhD professor at the Lerner College of Medicine and an immunologist at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner Research Institute. He is developing a preventive vaccine for breast cancer. He reviewed the study findings for WebMD. The encouraging observation from Gulleys study he says is the durable resolution of breast cancer in one patient. On the other hand he says the study shows the difficulty in prompting immune responses from patients whose cancer has spread and who have already had chemotherapy. There are many ways that mature tumors can turn off the immune response directed against them Tuohy tells WebMD. He agrees that the vaccine may work better in certain patients including those who have had fewer chemotherapy regimens and that giving the vaccine earlier is better."