Therapeutic vaccine strategies in cancer: advances, challenges, and future directions

Abstract Driven by recent scientific breakthroughs that underscore the critical role of the immune system in tumor development, strategies targeting the immune system have emerged as a promising avenue for cancer therapy. Therapeutic vaccine strategies represent a dynamic and evolving approach in cancer immunotherapy, offering the potential for more effective and personalized treatment options for patients. This review describes significant advancements in therapeutic vaccine strategies that leverage the immune response to target and eliminate cancer cells. The combination of these vaccines with immune checkpoint inhibitors has shown encouraging clinical outcomes, including improved survival rates and tumor reduction across multiple cancer types. This review also addresses key challenges for cancer vaccines such as overall low immunogenicity and tumor heterogeneity, highlighting the potential of combination therapies to overcome these barriers and enhance treatment efficacy.