Cancer free patientsI'm not sure if anyone has pointed this out but according to the new swimmer's plot there were:
2 patients still cancer free at 3 years after only one treatnent!
1 patient still cancer free at 2.5 years after only one treatnent!
1 patient still cancer free at 1.75 years after only one treatnent!
1 patient still cancer free at 1.25 years after only one treatnent!
So far all of our results have been obtained with no patient having had more than 2 treatments.
Clearly Ruvidar PDT is capable of completely eradicating NMIBC after only a single treatment. Why are some patients (about a third) not responding at all and why are some responders experiencing recurrence?
Not all of the patients who had no response or whose cancer recurred could have had upper urinary tract cancer. A substantial number probably had cancer cells which were deep enough below the surface of the urothelium that the green light did not reach them.
Theralase used green light, which has minimal penetration depth, to ensure there was no damage to the underlying healthy tissue. I wonder if better overall results might not be possible in the future with further optimiztion - maybe with the judicious (targeted) use of deeper penetrating red light and the replacement of TLD1433 with Rutherrin,