Experimental and clinical results of application of antitumor vaccines obtained by means of bacterial metabolism.

By means of metabolic products of the AB-56 strain of Bac. mesentericus it was possible to produce specific antitumor vaccines which both in experimental and clinical conditions proved to have prophylactic and therapeutic effects. 60-100% of the animals prophylactically immunized with these vaccines became resistant to a subsequent injection of living virulent cells, the percentage depending on the number of immunizations. The employment of similar autovaccines in the treatment of relapses and metastases in humans resulted in a 56% five-year survival of patients operated on for gastric cancer, in contrast to a 28% five-year survival of those without any vaccination.