Phase I Study in Advanced Cancer Patients of a Diversified Prime-and-Boost Vaccination Protocol Using Recombinant Vaccinia Virus and Recombinant Nonreplicating Avipox Virus to Elicit Anti–Carcinoembryonic Antigen Immune Responses

Abstract

rV-CEA was more effective in its role as a primer of the immune system; avipox-CEA could be given up to eight times with continued increases in CEA T-cell precursors. Future trials should use rV-CEA first followed by avipox-CEA. Vaccines specific to CEA are able to generate CEA-specific T-cell responses in patients without significant toxicity. T-cell responses using vaccines alone may be inadequate to generate significant anticancer objective responses in patients with advanced disease. Cytokines such as GM-CSF and IL-2 may play a key role in generating such responses.