Cancer Therapy (Chemotherapy and Immunotherapy)

Tanner Cancer Care uses many tools to treat cancer. If you’ve been diagnosed with cancer, your treatment plan may include chemotherapy — often called “chemo” — hormonal therapy, targeted agents, or immunotherapy. The latter two are newer approaches to cancer treatment.

Chemotherapy may be used alone or — most often — with other treatments such as surgery or radiation therapy. This treatment helps shrink your tumor before surgery to remove it or kill any undetected tumor cells that may remain after surgery.

Immunotherapy uses different medications to activate your body’s own immune response, literally turning your body against your cancer. Many immunotherapy medications are still in development, but show promise in treating cancer with fewer side effects than chemotherapy. Access to clinical trials like those we offer ensures you have the earliest access to the most advanced treatments available.

We are proud to offer chemotherapy and immunotherapy services and treatment for blood disorders in partnership with the medical oncology specialists at Northwest Georgia Oncology Centers.

Types of chemotherapy treatment

There are more than 100 different chemotherapy agents, with very different side effect profiles. Chemotherapy may be used alone or in combination with other treatments such as surgery or radiation therapy. For instance, this treatment may be used to shrink your tumor before surgery. It is often used after successful surgery to “clean up”, to eradicate any cancer cells that might not be detected by normal blood and radiological studies, but which can come back later.

Hormonal therapies are often oral medications. They work through the body’s hormonal pathways (e.g., estrogen or testosterone) to treat cancers or prevent them from recurring. They are frequently much less toxic overall, but do have some side effects.

Targeted therapies may be oral or intravenous drugs. They either target highly specific processes within cancer cells or specific surface targets on cancer cells. The common thread is that these agents are much more specific for cancer cells, with much lower toxicity to normal cells.

Immunotherapy uses various medications to support your body’s immune response. Cancer cells have developed tricks to look invisible to your immune system. These drugs help take the blinders off the eyes of your immune system cells- and what an incredible fighting force your immune system can be! Many immunotherapy medications are still in development but show promise in treating cancer with fewer side effects than chemotherapy. Access to clinical trials like those we offer ensures you have the earliest access to the most advanced treatments available.

Your doctor may prescribe more than one drug at a time or different drugs over time. Your specific treatment will depend on:

• The type of cancer you have
• How advanced it is (what stage)
• Whether you’ve had chemotherapy before
• Your overall physical health

How chemotherapy works

Chemotherapy works by killing fast-growing cells, such as those in your tumor. Your doctor may use chemotherapy drugs to:

• Cure your cancer
• Reduce the risk it will return
• Shrink tumors that are causing symptoms, such as pain

Chemotherapy is a systemic treatment, affecting your whole body — not just the tumor. It also affects healthy cells and can cause side effects. The most common side effect of chemotherapy treatment is fatigue.

How immunotherapy works

Your immune system is already hard at work ridding your body of abnormal cells, along with protecting you from infections and helping you heal.

Immunotherapy harnesses your immune system, teaching it to destroy the specific abnormal cells that are the basis of your cancer. Immunotherapy has shown tremendous promise in slowing and even stopping cancer growth.

Types of immunotherapy treatments

As with chemotherapy, there are several types of immunotherapy treatments. Your doctor may prescribe:

• Immune checkpoint inhibitors –These treatments help remove the blocks (or checkpoints) that the cancer cells create to stop your immune system from reacting properly, allowing your immune system to more aggressively respond to your cancer.
• Immune system modulators – This treatment reinforces your immune response against cancer, sometimes enhancing specific parts of your immune system or otherwise affecting your immune system at large.
• Monoclonal antibodies – Produced in a lab, these are immune system proteins that bind to specific parts of a cancer cell. Also called therapeutic antibodies, these can either inhibit cell reproduction or “mark” cells for your immune system to target more effectively.
• Treatment vaccines – Just as traditional vaccines are designed to trigger an immune response, so are treatment vaccines, which prepare your immune system to attack cancer cells.
• T-cell transfer therapy – T cells are part of your immune system that attack diseases. With T-cell transfer therapy — also called adoptive cell therapy or adoptive immunotherapy — doctors remove T cells from your body, engineer them to recognize cancer-specific proteins, then reproduce or expand them in great numbers and infuse them back into your body. We work with local centers to assist with this complex care.

New types and approaches to immunotherapy are constantly being developed. The experienced, board-certified medical oncologists at Tanner Cancer Care remain focused on research and on the potential of these medications to improve your outcomes.

We are proud to offer these treatments for cancer and blood disorders in partnership with the medical oncology specialists at Northwest Georgia Oncology Centers.

Managing the side effects of cancer treatment

Managing treatment-related side effects is part of your overall cancer care at Tanner. Tell your healthcare team about any side effects you experience during treatment.

As part of a regional health system, we can provide access to a range of specialists and other medical experts who can discuss these side effects and ways to alleviate them.

Learn More

• Find a cancer care specialist.
• Learn about radiation therapy.