ABSTRACT After 6 years of follow-up treating 364 canine melanoma patients, we present here results about the proof-of-concept, safety, and efficacy of a new surgery adjuvant combined gene

therapy. The adjuvant treatment (AT) group was divided in three arms as follows: (i) complete surgery plus vaccine (CS-V), (ii) complete surgery plus combined treatment (CS-CT), and (iii)

partial surgery plus combined treatment (PS-CT). Besides the genetic vaccines composed by tumor extracts and lipoplexes carrying human interleukin-2 and granulocyte-macrophage

colony-stimulating factor genes, the patients were subjected to combined treatment received in the post-surgical bed injections of lipid-complexed thymidine kinase suicide gene plus

control of metastatic disease (M0: 80%) compared with So (M0: 44%). In addition, AT produced a significant 9.3- (CS-CT), 6.5- (CS-V), and 5.4-fold (PS-CT) increase of overall survival as

compared with their respective So controls. In general terms, the AT changed a lethal disease into a chronic disease where 70% of CS-CT, 51% of CS-V, and 14% of PS-CT patients died of

melanoma unrelated causes. These surgery adjuvant treatments delayed or prevented post-surgical recurrence and distant metastasis, and improved disease-free and overall survival while

maintaining quality of life. These successful outcomes encourage assaying a similar scheme for human melanoma. Access through your institution Buy or subscribe This is a preview of

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FOR UNRESECTABLE AND METASTATIC MELANOMA: CURRENT STATUS AND FUTURE PERSPECTIVES Article Open access 27 July 2020 COMBINATION RADIATION AND ΑPD-L1 ENHANCE TUMOR CONTROL BY STIMULATING CD8+ 

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Download references ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We are grateful to our patients and their owners for their cooperation and participation in this study. We recognize the technical assistance and advice

of MSc. Doris Riveros, Ms. Graciela Zenobi, and MSc. Juan Cardini. We thank all VMDs involved in this study for patients’ treatment and care, especially Drs. Fernando Calcagno, José L.

Suárez, Pablo Meyer, Julián Piñeyra, Jorge Blomberg, Soledad Ramírez, Agustina Spector, Alexis Jalikias, Marie Maminska, Lorena Peteta, Martín Aureggi, and Alejandro Goldman. This work was

partially supported by grants from ANPCYT/FONCYT (PICT2012-1738 and PICT2014-1652) and CONICET (PIP 11220110100627 and PIP 11220150100885). L.M.E.F. and G.C.G. are investigators of the

Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET, Argentina), and C.F. and L.A. are research fellows of the CONICET. AUTHOR INFORMATION AUTHORS AND AFFILIATIONS * Unidad

de Transferencia Genética, Instituto de Oncología “Ángel H. Roffo”, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires, Argentina Liliana M. E. Finocchiaro, Lucrecia Agnetti, Chiara Fondello & 

Gerardo C. Glikin Authors * Liliana M. E. Finocchiaro View author publications You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Lucrecia Agnetti View author publications You can

also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Chiara Fondello View author publications You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Gerardo C. Glikin View author

publications You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar CORRESPONDING AUTHOR Correspondence to Liliana M. E. Finocchiaro. ETHICS DECLARATIONS CONFLICT OF INTEREST The

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Combination of cytokine-enhanced vaccine and chemo-gene therapy as surgery adjuvant treatments for spontaneous canine melanoma. _Gene Ther_ 26, 418–431 (2019).

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41434-019-0066-7 Download citation * Received: 04 December 2018 * Revised: 20 February 2019 * Accepted: 21 February 2019 * Published: 11 March 2019 * Issue Date:

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