SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Nov. 18, 2025 — A leading-edge cellular therapy for treating melanoma cancer known as TIL (tumor infiltrating lymphocytes) requires removal of part of the tumor, isolating the tumor’s immune cells, multiplying them, and then infusing the patient with a resurgent army of billions of new TIL cells ready to attack the cancer.
Before that can happen, patients undergo a procedure to get rid of old immune cells to make room for the advancing new army of TILs. Known as lymphodepletion, this process has usually been conducted during week-long hospital stays.
But a year-long HonorHealth Research Institute study associated with a clinical trial, showed that lymphodepletion can be conducted safely without the need for patients staying in the hospital overnight.
Among 13 HonorHealth patients between early 2024 and early 2025, all but one successfully completed chemotherapy and received TIL, and 11 of those 12 completed their lymphodepletion at home, instead of in the hospital, preventing a collective 77 in-patient hospital days, the study said. Only 2 patients required hospital admission during lymphodepletion.
As a result, they reduced the risk of hospital acquired infections, decreased costs and strain on the care system, maintained safety and increased patient satisfaction.
“The patients can be with their families, sleep at home, and eat their own food,” said Nurse Practitioner Molly Drought, lead author of the study, which she presented last month at the Society for Melanoma Research 22nd International Congress in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
“Our hope is that other sites will start using this protocol, or something similar,” Drought said. “The safety was the biggest thing we were looking at, and (outpatient lymphodepletion) was proven to be just a safe as in-patient.”
The study was supervised by Justin Moser, M.D., an associate clinical investigator in the Research Institute’s Oncology Research Division, where he specializes in a rare cancer that starts in the eye, known as ocular melanoma.
“Lymphodepletion makes room for new immune cells, prevents competition among immune cells, and allows the new immune cells to fight cancer more effectively, thereby helping boost the success rate of the therapy and leading to better long-term outcomes for patients,” Dr. Moser said.
