text_1: Immunotherapy shows promise in preventing leukemia relapse
text_2: This release about a small trial of immunotherapy applied to a dozen leukemia patients who are at unusually high risk of relapse leaps to premature interpretations and inflates the meaning of the results far beyond the limited guidance for future research that this sort of study can offer. It inappropriately elevates the importance of relapse rates, implying that they predict vital outcomes, such as survival or quality life improvements, which this trial did not measure. Even as it puffs up the potential benefits, the release neglects to note either the short-term harms reported by researchers in their scientific conference abstract or the potential life-threatening harms that immunotherapy may expose patients to. The release doesn’t provide context for how these trial results relate to  existing or other experimental treatments, and it makes makes only an oblique reference to the personal financial stakes of a lead researcher. It does not make any reference to cost, even though recently-approved immunotherapy treatments suggest the price tag could be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. On the positive side, the release does a good job of explaining why adjuvant treatment to enhance the immune system after bone marrow transplant may be necessary in certain leukemia patients. Relapse rates may reveal important clues to how long patients may live or how they will feel, but then again they may not. Any surmised connection between this sort of intermediate endpoint and the things that really mean something to patients must be tested. Until survival or quality of life trials are performed, news releases should not imply that an intermediate endpoint result, such as relapse rate, predicts better or longer life for patients.