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Immunotherapy is the use of medicines to stimulate a person’s own immune system to recognize and destroy cancer cells more effectively. Immunotherapy can be used to treat some types of breast cancer.

Immune checkpoint inhibitors

An important part of the immune system is its ability to keep itself from attacking normal cells in the body. To do this, it uses “checkpoints,” which are proteins on immune cells that need to be turned on (or off) to start an immune response. Breast cancer cells sometimes use these checkpoints to avoid being attacked by the immune system. Drugs that target these checkpoint proteins help to restore the immune response against breast cancer cells.

PD-1 inhibitor

Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) for breast cancer  

Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) is a drug that targets PD-1, a protein on immune system cells called T cells that normally help keep these cells from attacking other cells in the body. By blocking PD-1, these drugs boost the immune response against breast cancer cells. This can often shrink tumors.

It can be used with chemotherapy to treat triple-negative breast cancer (that makes the PD-L1 protein) that:

• has come back (recurred) locally but can’t be removed by surgery and hasn’t been treated with chemotherapy this time OR  
• has spread to other parts of the body and has not been treated with chemotherapy this time.

This drug is given as an intravenous (IV) infusion, typically every 3 or 6 weeks. 

Possible side effects of immune checkpoint inhibitors

Side effects of these drugs can include fatigue, cough, nausea, skin rash, poor appetite, constipation, and diarrhea.

Other, more serious side effects occur less often.

Infusion reactions:  Some people might have an infusion reaction while getting these drugs. This is like an allergic reaction, and can include fever, chills, flushing of the face, rash, itchy skin, feeling dizzy, wheezing, and trouble breathing. It’s important to tell your doctor or nurse right away if you have any of these symptoms while getting these drugs.

Autoimmune reactions: These drugs remove one of the safeguards on the body's immune system. Sometimes the immune system starts attacking other parts of the body, which can cause serious or even life-threatening problems in the lungs, intestines, liver, hormone-making glands, kidneys, or other organs.

It’s very important to report any new side effects to your health care team quickly. If serious side effects do occur, treatment may need to be stopped and you may get high doses of corticosteroids to suppress your immune system.