Start Tour
presents
End Tour
Treatment Guide:
The Effects of Immunotherapy for Lung Cancer On the Body
Immunotherapy drugs
Some people receiving immunotherapy drugs may develop an infusion reaction. Symptoms are similar to an allergic reaction. They can include fever, chills, difficulty breathing, itchy skin, rash, flushing of the face, and wheezing.
If a person experiences any of these or other unusual symptoms after receiving immunotherapy, they should contact their healthcare professional as soon as possible. This reaction is serious and can be life threatening.
Infusion reaction
The body's immune cells attack foreign cells, such as bacteria or viruses. Immunotherapy exposes cancer cells as foreign cells, enabling the immune cells to begin attacking the cancer cells.
Some immunotherapy drugs can also increase the number of immune cells. That makes more immune cells available to damage and destroy
the cancer cells.
Immune cells
When cancer cells mask themselves as typical cells, the immune system cannot protect the body.
However, once the immunotherapy drugs are working, the immune system can begin seeking out and destroying cancer cells.
In other words, immunotherapy drugs turn the immune system on and help it respond to cancer.
Immune system
The Effects of Immunotherapy for Lung Cancer On the Body
Treatment Guide:
Inflammatory response
Once immunotherapy begins, cancer cells lose their disguise, and the body's immune cells no longer regard them as typical cells.
The body then starts to destroy the cancer cells, and tumors shrink or stop growing.
Cancer cells
A person receives immunotherapy drugs for lung cancer via an IV infusion. Most people will have the treatment every few weeks, which will continue as long as the cancer is responding to the drugs.
Sometimes, a person will receive immunotherapy drugs alongside other treatments for lung cancer. This includes chemotherapy. Other times, they are a stand-alone treatment.
- fatigue
- nausea
- skin rash
- diarrhea
- anemia
2
1
2
1
2
1
The immune system may attack the kidneys, lungs, liver, intestines, or other organs.
People with lung cancer and preexisting autoimmune disorders may also experience flares or relapses while receiving immunotherapy.
2
1
Systemic medications, such as immunotherapy
drugs, are given through an IV infusion and circulate throughout the body's bloodstream. The drugs stimulate the immune system to fight. This can have an unintended side effect — an overstimulated inflammatory response.
When this happens, the body may begin attacking healthy cells, tissues, or organs. This is known as autoimmunity and can be a serious, even life threatening condition.
Common side effects of immunotherapy for lung cancer include: