1. Biological Medicine
By Benji Marks

2. What is it?
Biological drugs: substance made from a living organism (or its products) and is used for treatment and prevention of cancer (and other diseases)
(Anything that is naturally made and can fight off infection)
Examples are: vaccines, antibodies, interleukins (immune system)
NEXT: Examples/developments

3. Bacteriophages Alternative to antibiotics (antibiotic resistance)
Uses viruses to kill bacteria (interesting!!)
Discovered in 1917, but was eclipsed by the discovery of penicillin
How they work:
Phage lands on bacteria cell
Injects its DNA into the bacteria
DNA is copied and used for packaging to make a new generation of phages
New phages assemble and release toxins to kill bacteria cell and spread

4. Advantages of Bacteriophages
Specific to one species of bacteria, so do not disturb any beneficial bacterial cells
Destroy the bacterial cell wall and cell membrane= harder for bacteria to develop to resistance as cell is killed
Digests biofilm (thick layer that bacteria make to protect them from antibiotics)
No major safety concerns if done properly (research suggests)

5. Why are phages not used?
More difficult to prepare cleanly: large quantity of bacteria have to be grown and non-removal of dead bacteria cell= sepsis
Hard to judge the concentration needed: low conc.= ineffective
Many early trials of phage therapy were of poor quality= discredited
Longer time to employ in treatment (compared to antibiotics): searching for correct phage takes time, which isn’t ideal if patient is very ill
Not a lot of data: phage therapy was abandoned decades ago, but lots of research is happening (in France and Georgia particularly)

6. Stem Cell Treatment
Undifferentiated cells which can become specialised to suit a particular purpose (e.g: blood cells, brain cells, heart muscle cells)
Extracted from either bone marrow (more popular) or embryos
Used to treat: leukaemia, severe aplastic anaemia, sickle cell anaemia
Procedure:
Extraction of stem cells
Conditioning of body for treatment (chemotherapy)
Transplanting stem cells (injection)
Recovery in hospital for 8-12 weeks (usually)

7. Risks
Graft versus Host Disease (GvHD)- transplanted cells can recognise recipient’s cells as ‘foreign’ and attack them
Symptoms: rash, diarrhoea, nausea, joint pain, breath shortness
Reduced number of blood cells- blood cells damaged during chemotherapy, could be harmful until replaced after a few weeks
Can lead to: anaemia, excessive bleeding/bruising, infections
Chemotherapy side effects: nausea, diarrhoea, loss of appetite, tiredness, hair loss (all temporary)
High dose: permanent infertility

8. Benefits
Recently shown to be able to treat Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Stroke as new brain cells can be made from stem cells
Can treat MS- research starting from March 2018 showed a 6% failure in stem cell treatment as opposed to 60% failure in drug treatments (Dr. Richard Burt)
Can treat a variety of diseases
Relatively new discovery: advancements can only increase from here. Hope is for stem cells to be a “renewable source of replacement cells and tissues” in the future

9. References
antibiotics-problem/ transplant/in-depth/stem-cells/art