It may now be possible to tell who is going to react badly to some forms of cancer therapy, Elizabeth Tracey reports

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Immunotherapies for cancer can be lifesavers, but they can also provoke an overwhelming immune response that can be life threatening. Now a Johns Hopkins study may help pinpoint who is at risk for this type of reaction. Kimmel Cancer Center director William Nelson describes the findings.

Nelson: They could track cytokines. These are proteins that are released from the immune cells as they talk to each other and they saw a cytokines characteristic of a particular kind of T cell called a T helper 17 cell and a couple of other cytokine signatures. Once those were released they appeared to be more associated with folks who got the immune related adverse events. These are the tests you can do in the blood, you can predict who may be more likely to get them and this could be a valuable kind of tool as you begin to treat people to be much more on the lookout for these types of side effects.    :33

Nelson says the good news is these types of reactions are usually controllable when caught early. At Johns Hopkins, I’m Elizabeth Tracey.