The field of tumor immunology has produced in the recent years a revolution in cancer therapeutics putting an end in the long lasting frustration of investigators in the area stemming from largely unsuccessful strides to develop cancer vaccines. This progress has come from the introduction of immune checkpoint inhibitors, monoclonal antibodies blocking ligand/receptor pairs with inhibitory effects for immune cells. Through this blockade immune checkpoint blockers are able to activate the immune system and create an anti-tumoral effect. A significant sub-set of patients with various types of cancers such as melanoma, lung carcinomas and urothelial cancers benefit from treatment with these drugs and survivals have improved in some cases. However other cancers are primarily resistant to immune blockers and secondary resistance is also the norm. Radiation therapy is often used in the palliative treatment of patients with advanced cancers and, in addition to the local effect in the irradiated field, it may in rare cases produce a systemic antitumor effect, termed "abscopal". This effect has been suggested to be produced by immune mechanisms. Thus an opportunity presents for a synergistic effect of immune stimulation between radiation and immune blockade inhibitors. The therapeutic opportunities presented with the combination of radiation and these drugs for gastrointestinal cancers will be discussed in this editorial overview.
Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutical Science
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5%
Unknown
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Attention Score in Context
Attention Score in Context
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 5. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 02 November 2020.
All research outputs
#6,652,034
of 23,923,788 outputs
Outputs from World Journal of Gastrointestinal Oncology
#65
of 404 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#114,770
of 340,663 outputs
Outputs of similar age from World Journal of Gastrointestinal Oncology
#2
of 9 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 23,923,788 research outputs across all sources so far. This one has received more attention than most of these and is in the 71st percentile.
So far Altmetric has tracked 404 research outputs from this source. They receive a mean Attention Score of 3.9. This one has done well, scoring higher than 84% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 340,663 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has gotten more attention than average, scoring higher than 65% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 9 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has scored higher than 7 of them.
