▲The medical team at the CAR T-Cell Therapy Center is discussing the treatment direction for a recurrent or refractory B-cell acute lymphocytic leukemia patient during the multidisciplinary clinic.

AMC Cancer Institute has recently opened the CAR T-Cell Therapy Center specialized in CAR T (Chimeric antigen receptor T cell) therapy. In addition, CAR T-Cell Therapy Center has started Kymriah (CAR T therapy) treatment, certified by Novartis and covered by the National Health Insurance.

CAR T therapy involves extraction of a patient’s own immune cells (T-cells) and engineering of the T-cells to express chimeric antigen receptors that react to certain cancer cells, after which the cells are infused into the patient again to destroy cancer cells. The therapy is applicable to patients who are 25 years or younger with recurrent or refractory B-cell acute lymphocytic leukemia and adult patients with recurrent or refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma.

So far, relapsed and/or refractory B-cell acute lymphocytic leukemia and relapsed and/or refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma have been difficult to cure with post-diagnosis life expectancy of only 6 months. However, it is known that the cancer is completely eradicated in approximately 80% of recurrent or refractory B-cell acute lymphocytic leukemia in pediatric patients and half of the adult patients with recurrent or refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma.

Adult patients will be treated by Professor Dok Hyun Yoon and Professor Hyungwoo Cho of Oncology and Professor Jung-hee Lee and Professor Han-seung Park of Hematology. Pediatric patients will be treated by Professor Ho Joon Im, Professor Kyung-Nam Koh, Professor Hyery Kim, and Professor Sung-Han Kang of Pediatric Hematology & Oncology.

Professor Dok Hyun Yoon, the Director of the CAR T-Cell Therapy Center, said, “The first multidisciplinary CAR T therapy clinic was created through collaboration among different departments including ICU, Neurology and Infectious Diseases. We will establish protocols for treatment to detect possible side effects at an early stage and provide safe treatment.”