Novel immunotherapy combination can be highly effective for treating lung cancer McMaster University researchers have established in lab settings that a novel combination of two forms of immunotherapy can be highly effective for treating lung cancer, which causes more deaths than any other form of cancer. The new treatment, yet to be tested on patients, uses one form of therapy to kill a significant number of lung tumor cells, while triggering changes to the tumor that enable the second therapy to finish the job. The first therapy employs suppressed "natural killer" immune cells by extracting them from patients' tumors or blood and supercharging them for three weeks. The researchers condition the cells by expanding and activating them using tumor-like feeder cells to improve their effectiveness before sending them back into battle against notoriously challenging lung tumors.