Equipping People To Make Sense Of What They Are Told
Tovaxin - An autologous T-cell vaccine, which means it is prepared from a sample
of the patient's own cells. Myelin-reactive T-cells are extracted from the blood
and irradiated to produce a vaccine. When the vaccine is injected, the body sees
these modified T-cells as being foreign and attacks them, priming the immune system
to attack non-irradiated, myelin-reactive T-cells as well. The prepared vaccine is
injected under the skin.
To produce the Tovaxin vaccine, Opexa uses its innovative T-cell platform to isolate
MRTCs from an MS patient’s blood and then expand them ex vivo to create an appropriate
therapeutic dose. The attenuated T-cells, which comprise the Tovaxin vaccine, are
then reintroduced into the patient via subcutaneous injection to trigger the immune
system to attack that patient’s specific MRTCs.
In a small preliminary study, the drug demonstrated promise, reducing MS relapses
by 90%.
Tovaxin possesses a unique dual mechanism of action that combats the demyelination
of the nerve fibres in the central nervous system, the underlying cause of MS. Clinical
results have demonstrated that Tovaxin produces the following therapeutic effects:
Anti-idiotypic effect - The vaccine induces an immune response that depletes the
circulating pathogenic MRTCs (myelin reactive T-cells) that attack the myelin sheath
of nerve fibres and cause the symptoms of MS.
Anti-ergotypic effect - Tovaxin also works to rebalance a patient’s overall immune
system by causing a shift from pathogenic inflammatory T-cells to anti-inflammatory
T-cells.
Autologous refers to cells, tissues or even proteins that are reimplanted in the
same individual that they come from
T cells belong to a group of white blood cells known as lymphocytes, and play a central
role in cell-mediated immunity. The abbreviation T in T cell, stands for thymus,
since it is the principal organ in the T cell's development.
