- [Dr. Edelson] I take care of a very serious cancer of white blood cells
that starts in the skin and then spreads internally.
It's commonly fatal.
Chemotherapy wasn't working.
I needed better therapy.
I decided that I would try to develop an immune approach
to control or even destroy the malignant cells.
- Photophoresis was originally developed for a type of cancer of the white blood cells called cutaneous T-cell lymphoma.
- Photophoresis is a cellular immunotherapy
capable of turning on the immune system when you need a stronger reaction,
or turning it off when the immune system is actually causing the problem.
- Photophoresis works in different ways for the different diseases that we use it for.
- It's kind of resetting the immune system
and allowing it to recover.
- It's doing what the immune system does normally
and that's different than virtually all other man-made therapies.
- [Dr. Girardi] There's been a tremendous recognition of the power of photophoresis
for two major indications beyond leukemia and lymphoma,
that is for Graft-versus-host disease and for organ transplant rejection.
- It all started with my leukemia.
I had a 35% chance of survival.
I got a stem cell transplant several months after I developed symptoms of Graft-versus-host disease.
- When I had a disease, my heart became so weak, I had multiple organ failure,
the doctors recommended for a transplanted heart.
After the transplant, the anti-rejection drugs were causing kidney failure.
- Fluid was really coming out of his blood vessels into his tissues, into his skin.
His body was shutting down.
- Losing my independence was a challenge.
Being away from work and having to depend on everybody.
I was alive, but I didn't have my life back.
- [Louis] I started to swell up, my body swelled.
The physical pain became unbearable.
- Medications that suppress the immune system long term
can have some unacceptable side effects.
- I had lost hope, I really thought that I was going to die.
Then the photophoresis was suggested and things turned around from there.
- [Dr. Girardi] Photophoresis is a treatment,
it's used to access the white blood cells that might be causing a disease.
When we treat a patient's blood, the disease-causing T-cells
gets stunned by ultra-violet light and the presence of psoralen.
Psoralen's a naturally occurring compound found, for example, in lemons.
- [Dr. Edelson] When it's activated by light,
it goes from being a completely inert or inactive drug,
to becoming as potent a chemotherapeutic agent as exists.
- [Dr. Girardi] And what that does is it creates this effect to help decrease these over reactive T-cells.
We're working with the patient's immune system to moderate the disease.
- The wonderful thing about photophoresis, is that it's a very high benefit, low-risk treatment.
- My kidneys recovered to a point where I could be normal weight, normal strength.
It prevented the heart rejection from the white blood cells
without having to take the medications that were causing the kidney failure.
- The swelling had started to come down.
I was convinced after about six treatments that I was on the right course.
- [Dr. Carlson] We form very deep relationships with these patients.
- [Dr. Girardi] We're kind of welcoming them into our family in photophoresis.
- With the encouragement of the nurses,
I feel like I came back to believing that I could survive it.
- We really try to coordinate with the patient's schedule
so that they're not losing any more time from work or family events.
- I go to work and I live independently.
I've been able to do more and more physical activities,
both at work and out of work and I have family that enjoys me.
We have fun together.
- Allan had a pretty quick response to photophoresis
within the span of a couple of months
we got great reports from his transplantation docs
that the rejections have been stopping.
- When I started photophoresis, it gave me that opportunity to actually live my life.
- [Louis] I spent all of last year thinking about the bike, but not really being able to ride it.
I missed it a great deal.
I've been riding on and off for my whole life.
You forget all your troubles when you're in the wind.
I'm excited about the fact that I'll be able to ride this year.
- [Dr. Carlson] Now when I see Louis walk in,
I can see that he's the happy guy that he always used to be
before the Graft-versus-host disease kind of beat him down.
- I'm grateful that I found photophoresis because they certainly turned me around
and given me hope for a good long future.
- [Dr. Girardi] He's achieved a complete remission from his Graft-versus-host disease
and we hope to get him off of photophoresis
and just living his life the way he wants to.
- We're learning more and more about the immune and cellular affects
of what we're doing with photophoresis.
There's a further awareness now that we can sometimes get to these patients sooner
to help really prevent a more progressive disease.
- It far exceeds anything we could've imagined
and it continues to be driven into whole new areas.
- I'm really thrilled to be part of that research effort
to move photophoresis beyond what it is now.
- I have seen so many patients helped by this treatment.
I can't wait to help the next patient.
- [Dr. Edelson] It feel fantastic to be able to help so many people.
It's a thrill, it's a thrill.