Radiation Therapy and Nimotuzumab in Children and Adolescents with Brainstem Gliomas: A 5-Year Institutional Experience
The brainstem is defined as the midbrain, pons and medulla; brainstem gliomas are
generally diffuse intrinsic tumors involving the pons, with defined clinical presentation and
characteristic appearance in imaging findings and do not require pathological confirmation.
it can extend along neural tracts to adjacent regions of the brain, so it has been defined as fatal
disease. Radiation treatment response rates show low degrees of efficacy, with short-term responses and a median overall survival less than one year.
Diffusely infiltrating pontine glio-mas must be distinguished from other subsets of diffuse intrinsic
pontine gliomas, such as focal tumors, which are described with better prognosis and longer term surviva
The association of Chemotherapy and radiotherapy have not improved survival and now biologics are combined with RT in clinical trials.
We investigated the association of RT with Nimotuzumab, a humanized monoclonal antibody developed at the
Center of Molecular Immunology, Havana, Cuba and testing the hypothesis that this combination will improve survival in these tumors.
The antibody was obtained by humanization of the murine antibody EGF/R3.14 Because Nimotuzumab has a 10 fold
lower affinity to the EGFR, as compared to cetuximab, its capacity to bind EGFR is heavily dictated by cell receptor density. Nimotuzumab preclinical and clinical characterizations have been summarized before.
Neuro Open J. 2015; 2(1): 45-50. doi: 10.17140/NOJ-2-111
