Immunotherapy for nasal cavity and paranasal sinus cancer

Immunotherapy helps to strengthen or restore the immune system’s ability to fight cancer. Immunotherapy works to kill cancer cells and stop cancer cells from growing and spreading.

Some people with nasal cavity and paranasal sinus cancer have immunotherapy. If you have immunotherapy, your healthcare team will use what they know about the cancer and about your health to plan the drugs, doses and schedules.

The immune system normally stops itself from attacking normal cells in the body by using specific proteins called checkpoints. Checkpoints slow down or stop an immune system response. Some cancer cells sometimes use these checkpoints to hide and avoid being attacked by the immune system. Immune checkpoint inhibitors work by blocking the checkpoint proteins so immune system cells (called T cells) attack and kill the cancer cells.

Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) is an immune checkpoint inhibitor that targets the PD-1 checkpoint protein. It may be used to treat squamous cell carcinoma of the nasal cavity and paranasal sinus.

Side effects of immunotherapy will depend mainly on the type of drug or drug combination, the dose, how it’s given and your overall health. Tell your healthcare team if you have side effects that you think might be from immunotherapy. The sooner you tell them of any problems, the sooner they can suggest ways to help you deal with them.

Pembrolizumab may cause these side effects:

• fatigue
• diarrhea
• skin changes including rash
• nausea and vomiting
• muscle and joint pain
• low blood cell counts

All drugs, including those used to treat cancer, are approved for use in Canada by Health Canada. If a drug is mentioned on cancer.ca, it means that Health Canada has approved the drug and pharmaceutical companies sell it in Canada. It does not mean that the drug is offered everywhere in Canada.

Paying for drugs is the responsibility of provincial and territorial health departments. Each health department makes its own decisions about which drugs to cover (pay for) in that province or territory. This means that a drug may be covered in one province, but not in others.

Your oncologist will talk to you about different drug treatments and what is available through your provincial or territorial drug program.

Find out more about immunotherapy. To make the decisions that are right for you, ask your healthcare team questions about immunotherapy.

Details on specific drugs change regularly. Find out more about sources of drug information and where to get details on specific drugs.