Vaccine-Based Immunotherapy for Head and Neck Cancers

Simple Summary Therapeutic vaccines are given to patients with cancer, as opposed to prophylactic vaccines given to a healthy population. The challenge for therapeutic oncological vaccines is to stimulate an immune T cell response against endogenous (or derived) antigens that is sufficiently potent to induce cytotoxic activity and broad enough to take tumor heterogeneity into account. The purpose of this article is to provide an updated review of the prophylactic and therapeutic vaccines that target viral or non-viral antigens, particularly in head and neck cancers. In 2019, the FDA approved pembrolizumab, a monoclonal antibody targeting PD-1, for the first-line treatment of recurrent or metastatic head and neck cancers, despite only a limited number of patients benefiting from the treatment. Promising effects of therapeutic vaccination led the FDA to approve the use of the first therapeutic vaccine in prostate cancer in 2010. Research in the field of therapeutic vaccination, including possible synergistic effects with anti-PD(L)1 treatments, is evolving each year, and many vaccines are in pre-clinical and clinical studies. The aim of this review article is to discuss vaccines as a new therapeutic strategy, particularly in the field of head and neck cancers. Different vaccination technologies are discussed, as well as the results of the first clinical trials in HPV-positive, HPV-negative, and EBV-induced head and neck cancers.