Figure 1From: Adjuvant therapeutic vaccination in patients with non-small cell lung cancer made lymphopenic and reconstituted with autologous PBMC: first clinical experience and evidence of an immune responseOutline of the clinical trial protocol. Non-small cell lung cancer patients stages I-IIIa undergo curative surgery to prepare an autologous vaccine. The autologous tumor cells are physically minced and digested by a triple enzyme solution. The vaccine is then irradiated at 10,000 rads, tested for sterility and cryopreserved. Immediately following the intradermal vaccination (biweekly, total of up to five vaccinations) GM-CSF is infused subcutaneously for 6 days at a rate of 50 μg/24 h. Prior to vaccination plus GM-CSF administration, lymphopenia is induced by a 3-day combination chemotherapy (cyclophosphamide 350 mg/m2 and fludarabine 20 mg/m2) followed by reconstitution with autologous peripheral blood mononuclear cells. Two additional leukaphereses are harvested pre- and post-vaccination for immunemonitoring purposes. (CTX: chemotherapy)Back to article page