Mesothelioma Disappears With No Treatment

In September 2002, a 61-year-old Australian woman was diagnosed with mesothelioma. Two years later, she was cancer-free without any treatment. Although her doctor still doesn’t know exactly what caused her cancer to regress, he is hopeful that cases like hers will one day lead to a better understanding of mesothelioma, as well as to new and more effective treatments for the disease.

It’s exceedingly rare for a cancer to disappear on its own, although it can happen. There have been cases in virtually all types of cancers in which a patient has been diagnosed with the disease, only to show up cancer-free on a later exam.

Roger Allen, PhD, a Thoracic and Sleep Physician at Wesley Medical Centre in Brisbane, Australia reported in the Medical Journal of Australia on a patient who was referred to his center with severe chest pain. Two expert pathologists reviewed the patient’s chest scans and biopsy results, and confirmed the diagnosis—mesothelioma.

The patient had had a history of exposure to asbestos—the fibrous mineral implicated in most cases of mesothelioma. When she was young, she had worked as a machinist in a factory where asbestos was used. Years later she had washed her son’s work clothes when he worked for a company that produced asbestos gaskets.

Whenever the diagnosis is mesothelioma, the prognosis is usually grim. Patients survive an average of just one year with the disease. Treatments such as chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery can slow mesothelioma, but they usually can not stop it.

The patient in this report was referred to an oncologist and offered chemotherapy and an experimental treatment, but by the time she was set to begin therapy, her mesothelioma had already started to regress. She felt well enough to opt for no treatment.

When doctors examined the woman again in December 2002, the cancer had decreased in size. By 2004, a CT scan showed that the mesothelioma had virtually disappeared. The patient continues to see an oncologist today, and she remains cancer-free six years after her initial diagnosis.

Dr. Allen sees about 600 patients with asbestos-related diseases a year, and he believes this is the first case in Australia of a patient whose mesothelioma spontaneously regressed and stayed in remission for more than five years.

Doctors still don’t know exactly why some cancers disappear on their own, but the phenomenon may have to do with a combination of mechanisms, including a stimulation of the body’s immune response and factors that trigger cell changes and death. “We don’t know it all, but cancer cells are not invincible,” Dr. Allen says. Understanding the processes behind spontaneous regression could be the key to improving treatments for mesothelioma, he says.

Although it’s rare for a cancer to spontaneously regress, cases like this one should come as promising news to both patients and their doctors, according to Dr. Allen. “I think the message should be to always have hope, and it also gives us hope that one day we may be able to harness the immune system better.”


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