New hope for brain cancer patients 腦腫瘤患者的新希望

本集內容

New hope for brain cancer patients 個性化疫苗給腦腫瘤病人帶來新希望

學習要點

有關 “medicine 醫學” 的詞匯

邊看邊答

Which two things are used to make the personalised vaccine?

文字稿

This is a glioblastoma. It was found three years ago in Nigel’s brain. Now all traces appear to have gone.

這是一個惡性膠質瘤，三年前在奈傑爾的大腦裡被發現。但現在腫瘤的所有痕跡似乎已經消失瞭。

Nigel is a patient at London’s King’s College Hospital. And one of more than 300 volunteers on a trial of a personalised vaccine.

奈傑爾是倫敦國王學院醫院的一名病人，也是三百多位自願參加一項個性化疫苗試驗患者中的一員。

The trial extended average survival from 17 to 23 months. One in three patients survived for 40 months. And a few are still alive seven years on.

這個試驗將患者的平均存活時間從17個月延長到瞭23個月。平均每三位患者中有一位存活瞭40個月。還有一些患者七年過後仍存活。

So how does the treatment work?

那麼這個治療方法是如何起作用的呢？

First surgeons remove the patient’s tumour. They mix it with cells from their immune system. Once outside the brain, the tumour cannot hide from the body’s defences. And the immune cells learn to attack it.

首先，外科醫生切除病人的腫瘤。接著把腫瘤和病人免疫系統中的細胞混合。腫瘤在被切除後就不能躲避病人自身的防禦系統，從而免疫細胞將學會如何抵抗它。

These cells are turned into a personalised vaccine, individual to each patient who receives it.

這些細胞被制成個性化疫苗，每位患者都有自己的疫苗。

Kat Charles was not part of the trial. So she paid to have the vaccine privately three years ago.

凱特·查爾斯沒有參與這個試驗。所以她三年前開始自己付錢購買疫苗。

Every six months, she has a top-up injection. And so far, there’s no trace of her tumour.

每六個月，她就會註射一針。到目前為止，沒有發現腫瘤的痕跡。

3,000 people a year in the UK are diagnosed with glioblastoma. So an effective immunotherapy vaccine would be a significant advance in the treatment of brain cancer.

在英國，每年有三千多人被診斷患有惡性膠質瘤。因此，有效的免疫治療疫苗將是腦腫瘤治療的重大突破。

詞匯

vaccine 疫苗

treatment 治療，療法

tumour 腫瘤

immune system 免疫系統

cells 細胞

你知道嗎？

Learning a second language might boost brain power. The US researchers from Northwestern University say bilingualism is a form of brain training – a mental “work out” that fine-tunes the mind.

學習第二語言可能提高腦力。來自美國西北大學的研究人員稱雙語是一種大腦訓練的形式，一種 “腦力鍛煉”，可以微調大腦。