The immune system finds it difficult to distinguish and eliminate malignant, endogenous cells from healthy ones – unlike cells, for example, that are affected by viruses. However, cancer cells carry certain markers on the surface that prevent the immune system from destroying them. In vaccine therapy, these markers on the surface of the cancer cells are made known to the immune system as if on a 'wanted photo'. This way, any cells, whether in the primary tumor, in metastases, or in the blood, can be recognized as 'not belonging to the body' and be combated.

While personalized vaccines process and then inject tumor cells and their fragments, dendritic cells are endogenous and are shown the tumor cells outside the body, thus developing their effect. The metaphor of the "tumor cell vaccine as a wanted photo" can be continued by describing dendritic cells as the "patrol police" of the immune system. They are on the move in all areas of the body and are looking for foreign structures. These can be bacteria, viruses, but also degenerated surfaces of tumor cells. Once these have been identified, the lymph nodes receive the necessary information to initiate their combat with a body's own immune response.

Vaccine therapies can be carried out at any stage of the disease and for all solid tumors and blood cancer diseases. The less the immune system has previously been damaged by radiation or chemotherapy or suppressed by immunosuppressants such as cortisone, the better it can react to the tumor cells. The positive therapeutic effects of both therapies have been impressively demonstrated with simultaneously minor side effects in several studies.