GMP Laboratory
Relocation of the Malaghan Institute to Victoria University's Kelburn Campus in 2004 provided a golden opportunity to develop a state-of-the-art clinical production laboratory. This is the only laboratory in New Zealand dedicated solely to the production of immunotherapeutic vaccines and received official Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) accreditation from Medsafe in July 2006.
Working within this laboratory Clinical Trials Project Manager, Evelyn Bauer, produces tailor-made anti-tumour vaccines from a patient's own cells. On receiving a patient's tumour biopsy from the Wellington Cancer Centre, the tumour is first evaluated to determine whether or not there are sufficient useable cells in the sample for preparing a vaccine. If there are, the tumour cells are killed by irradiation so that they cannot cause further cancer when injected back into the patient.
The killed tumour cells are then ‘fed' to dendritic cells grown from the patient's own blood, which digest the tumour into tiny pieces that can be recognised by the immune system. The vaccine thus generated is then injected back into the patient, where the dendritic cells present the tumour pieces to the patient's T cells and instruct them to hunt out and destroy the tumour. Each patient receives 13 vaccinations in total to ensure that the immune system is fully informed about the task it has to perform.
At present the Malaghan Institute is involved in two cancer clinical trials, a stage III melanoma trial and a stage 1 glioma (brain cancer) trial.
For further information please contact:
Evelyn Bauer
Clinical Trials Production Manager
Tel: +64 4 499 6914
Email: ebauer@malaghan.org.nz
