Correlation of eosinophilia with clinical response in patients with advanced carcinoma treated with low-dose recombinant interleukin-2 and mitomycin C

Abstract

On the basis of our clinical findings that the ability of cancer patients to generate lymphokine-activated killer cells became markedly augmented after mitomycin C administration, we designed a treatment regimen comprising mitomycin C 12 mg/m2, i.v. on day 1 and recombinant interleukin-2 700 U/m2 (8000 IU/kg), i.v. every 12 h from day 4 through day 8. The treatment course was repeated at almost 7-day intervals. Altogether 33 patients with advanced carcinoma, including mainly gastrointestinal carcinoma, were treated with this regimen. Of these, 10 had a partial response (PR) and 4 had a minor response (MR). Since eosinophil counts peaked 1 day after either the first or second course of the therapy, the posttreatment values were compared to each pretreatment level, with regard to the clinical antitumor response to this treatment. When patients who showed PR were defined as responders, absolute eosinophil counts and the percentage of eosinophils in responders after both the first and second courses of the therapy were significantly greater than each pretreatment value or the posttreatment level in nonresponders. Further, these findings were almost identical, when both PR and MR were considered to be a true remission and therefore patients who exhibited PR or MR were defined as responders, although the difference between posttreatment levels of eosinophils in responders and nonresponders was not significant at the second course. These results indicate that eosinophilia induced by this treatment correlates with the clinical response to this therapy.

Peritumoral eosinophils predict recurrence in colorectal cancer

“…Efficacy of treatment with recombinant IL-2 in advanced cancers was associated with greater numbers of peritumoral eosinophils. 30 Administration of IL-4 following treatment with IL-2, furthermore, induced eosinophil degranulation in a dose-dependent manner, which was evident by elevated eosinophil's major basic proteins in blood samples along with moderate blood eosinophilia. 31,32 An eosinophil-dependent antitumoral mechanism of IL-4 was supported by animal studies with specific blockage of granulocytes and/or lymphocytes.…”

Combination immunotherapy with rituximab and interleukin 2 in patients with relapsed or refractory follicular non‐Hodgkin's lymphoma

“…All four patients in our study with significant eosinophilia (> 5 × 10 9 /l) responded to therapy. In other immunotherapy studies, the magnitude of eosinophilia after IL‐2 has correlated with response to therapy (Arinaga et al , 1992; Fabian et al , 1994).…”

Cancer-Related Symptom Clusters, Eosinophils, and Survival in Hepatobiliary Cancer: An Exploratory Study

“…Although the pathogenesis of eosinophilia is not well understood, necrosis of the tumor has been hypothesized as a possible etiology of eosinophilia (29). Although TATE and TABE often occur independently, TABE is more often observed in advanced disease or metastatic disease (31–37). …”

“…A separate but related literature regarding the role of tumor-associated tissue and blood eosinophilia (TATE and TABE, respectively), has lead to important advances in the treatment of cancer (29–30), namely the development of kinase inhibitors (e.g., imatinib mesylate, sorafenib) (31–32). TABE followed by treatment with kinase inhibitors has been shown to be associated with a favorable prognosis in patients with solid tumors (31–37). …”