Blood Cancer Awareness Month: How Immunotherapy Fights Leukemia, Lymphoma, and Multiple Myeloma

‘Blood cancer’ is an all-encompassing term for cancers that impact millions of people globally every year. The most common blood cancers are leukemia, lymphoma, and multiple myeloma. Each of these cancers is unique, but their common thread is they cause bone marrow and the lymphatic system to produce malfunctioning white blood cells. CRI-funded scientists and CRI ImmunoAdvocates are working hard to improve immunotherapy outcomes for blood cancer patients and to advocate on their behalf. 

“My experience with immunotherapy was truly a miracle.”

READ MORE: How Immunotherapy Saved Sonia’s Life

Leukemia: Leukemia is a type of cancer that affects the blood and bone marrow. It begins in the bone marrow, where blood cells are produced, and causes abnormal white blood cells. It is the most common cancer in children under 15 years of age.  

Lymphoma: Lymphoma is a type of cancer that originates in the lymphatic system, which is part of the body’s immune system. It primarily affects lymphocytes, a type of white blood cell that helps fight infections. Lymphoma causes these cells to grow uncontrollably, leading to the formation of tumors in the lymph nodes, spleen, bone marrow, and other parts of the lymphatic system.  

Multiple Myeloma: Multiple myeloma is a cancer that starts in the bone marrow and primarily targets plasma cells, a type of white blood cell that produces antibodies to combat infections. In this condition, abnormal plasma cells multiply excessively, resulting in a range of complications.  

CRI Scientists Share Recent Immunotherapy Progress Against Blood Cancers

In the past decade, CRI-funded scientists have made significant inroads in the fight against blood cancers, including two former CRI postdoctoral fellows who determined how a specific type of leukemia thwarts a proper immune response to the cancer. Immunotherapy research has vastly improved blood cancer patient outcomes for people who have specifically been treated with CAR T therapy. Several CRI-funded scientists focus their current research on CAR T therapy, including Marco Ruella, MD, assistant professor of medicine and scientific director of the Lymphoma Program at the University of Pennsylvania and 2024 CRI CLIP Investigator. Dr. Ruella’s grant focuses on lymphoma, but his clinic services patients for all of the major blood cancers. He said we are living in an exciting time for novel blood cancer immunotherapy research, and CAR T therapy shows promise as an earlier line of treatment. 

“In the last year we have seen the continuous expansion of indications for CAR T immunotherapy to more subsets of B cell leukemia and lymphomas,” Dr. Ruella said. “With the advent of gene editing, we are now able to modify our immunotherapies to make them more effective and potentially safer.”

He aims to unravel resistance mechanisms with CAR T immunotherapy, thereby developing more effective therapies for blood cancer patients. Dr. Ruella has published several research papers so far in 2024, including as the senior author of a Science Immunology publication detailing how the immune checkpoint protein CD5 magnifies the anti-tumor actions of adoptive CAR T cell therapies.

Other CRI-funded scientists share his passion and drive to conquer blood cancers through immunotherapy. Matteo Maria Bellone, MD, head of the Cellular Immunology Unit and medical consultant in clinical immunology at IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele in Italy, professor of immunology at the Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele in Italy, associate editor at Frontiers in Immunology and Frontiers in Oncology, and CRI CLIP Investigator, expressed a desire to design therapies for patients with smoldering multiple myeloma (SMM) to halt the disease before it becomes incurable. 

“We are investigating how microbes inhabiting our intestinal tract influence the immune response to neoplastic plasma cells, and how to manipulate these microbes to strengthen anti-tumor immunity,” Dr. Bellone told CRI. He described that interactions between cancer cells and the immune system can be large and complex – like a city riot fought in nooks and alleys. “Some cancer cells sneak through the immune cells’ fences, helped by corrupted guards. We need to make immune cells more efficient, to limit collateral damage, and to avoid excessive harm to the healthy tissue.”

Dr. Bellone’s grant project focuses on modulating both the gut microbiota and immune system response to multiple myeloma. In March of 2023, he published a research paper in Leukemia as a co-senior author that presented up-to-date evidence of diet and other lifestyle impacts on the gut microbiome, multiple myeloma incidence, and patient outcomes. 

Conclusion: Blood Cancer Symptoms and Screening

A non-exhaustive list of blood cancer symptoms includes night sweats, unexplained rashes and bleeding, frequent infections, and difficulty breathing. These symptoms do not always present in an early stage, and blood cancer testing can include conducting blood and bone marrow tests, imaging scans, physical exams, and staged surgical lymph node removal. By seeing a doctor if you are experiencing symptoms and encouraging loved ones to do the same, you can help create a world immune to cancer.