(Radio Iowa) – University of Iowa researchers have won a ten-million dollar federal grant to develop a new treatment for ovarian cancer.
Jill Kolesar, dean of the U-I College of Pharmacy, is working on a drug that will make ovarian tumors more sensitive to immunotherapy by helping the immune system recognize cells around them. Kolesar says this could bring ovarian cancer treatment into the 21st century, as she says the treatment paradigm hasn’t changed in the last 30 to 40 years. It’s estimated more than 12-thousand women nationwide will die from ovarian cancer this year.
Kolesar says ovarian cancer is often diagnosed in the late stages, which makes it harder to treat and nearly always fatal.
