Kidney cancer strikes more than 36,000 Americans a year, killing nearly 13,000. While it is curable if caught and removed early, when it spreads, options are few.

Now, for the first time in the United States, a vaccine is being tested against advanced kidney cancer.

Thelma Imm is about to get vaccinated. You might think a 77-year-old doesn’t need her shots anymore, unless it’s the flu shot, but one vaccine is one that might save her life.

“Actually I was diagnosed with colon cancer and then with a CAT scan they found the kidney cancer,” said Inn. “So I was operated on in July 2001 and they removed one kidney and part of the colon.”

For 3½ years, Imm did fine. But now, her kidney cancer returned, and has spread.

There are few treatment options for patients with advanced kidney cancer, but doctors at the Columbia campus of New York Presbyterian Hospital are testing a vaccine against kidney cancer.

What made this possible was the identification of an antigen, a protein marker made by kidney tumor cells but not the normal kidney.

“This is a great way to educate the immune system to attack the tumor cells that have this protein and to leave the normal kidney alone,” Dr. Howard Kaufman of Columbia University Medical Center.

Imm’s getting her second shot, which should stimulate her immune system to make killer white blood cells to go after the cancer. But doctors here have added a new wrinkle to make the vaccine more effective by growing more of these killer cells: high doses of another natural immune system molecule called Interleukin-2 or IL-2 for short.

“We can give IL-2 which acts as a growth factor to grow up large numbers of these and essentially make an army that can go out and find these tumor cells and kill them,” said Kaufman.

The combination therapy has been effective in animal tests and should improve therapy in people.

“In our hands this response can often last for about 3 to 4 years,” said Kaufman. “So even when you can’t cure patients you can often buy then significant amounts of time.

The vaccine part of the treatment seems to have few side effects but the high dosage of IL-2 can cause problems if not given by an experienced center.