Dr Tan Sen Mui

Designation

Senior Consultant Haematologist & Head of Haematology Department

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Institution

Hospital Ampang

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Qualification

M.D. (Hons) UKM 1994
MRCP (United Kingdom) 2000
PhD (Germany) 2015
FRCP (United Kingdom) 2019

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Special field of interest

Cancer immunotherapy

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Abstract

Title:

Cellular Immunotherapy (HSCT & CART) in Malaysia: Current Status & Future Perspective

Body:

Cellular immunotherapy is a rapidly evolving field, mainly harnesses our immune system to eradicate cancer cells. Haematology has been at the forefront of cellular immunotherapy advancements when Prof Dr E. Donnall Thomas pioneered the use of bone marrow transplantation to cure leukaemia and other haematologic malignancies since 1956. Following that, Prof Hans-Jochem Kolb introduced donor lymphocyte infusion (DLI) as the strategy to overcome leukaemia relapse in chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML) further proof the concept of cellular immunotherapy. Both allogeneic haematopoietic stem cell transplant (allo-HSCT) and DLI are non-specific cellular immunotherapy with the risk of introducing graft versus host disease, until the breakthrough innovation from Prof Carl June and his team in engineering chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cells for their first patient in 2012. CAR is programmed to target specific tumour-associated antigens (TAA), of which can be replicated rapidly and homogeneously. CAR-T-cell with its supraphysiologic activities work as an active medication, interacting with TAA which resulting in both immediate and long-term effects of anti-neoplasm that have been approved for the treatment of distinct haematologic malignancies, producing durable response in otherwise untreatable patients. This lecture will give the overview of the current status and future perspective of cellular immunotherapy in our country.