Everolimus Shows Potential In Tough-to-Treat Gastric Cancer

ORLANDO – Everolimus monotherapy shows promising activity and is generally well tolerated in patients with metastatic gastric cancer who have undergone prior anticancer therapy, according to phase 2 results reported by Japanese researchers at the American Society of Clinical Oncology’s 2010 Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium (ASCO GI).

Hiroya Takiuchi, MD, with Osaka Medical College, presented results in 53 patients with metastatic gastric cancer who received a daily 10 mg dose oral everolimus. All patients had failed up to two prior chemotherapy regimens.

Everolimus is an oral inhibitor of mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) that has demonstrated anticancer activity in preclinical cellular and animal models and also in patients with advanced gastric cancer.

“Because of poor long-term outcomes with surgery and standard chemotherapy management of advanced gastric cancer, it is important to study new targeted agents in this population,” Dr. Takiuchi said.

Oral everolimus was administered in continuous 28-day cycles until the patient developed progressive disease or unacceptable toxicity or elected to withdraw from the study for any other reason, with a dose reduction permitted for tolerability.

The primary study endpoint was disease control rate (DCR), defined as the proportion of patients with complete response, partial response or stable disease as the best overall response. Read more

Tracking New Cancer-Killing Particles With MRI

Researchers at Rice University and Baylor College of Medicine (BCM) have created a single nanoparticle that can be tracked in real time with MRI as it homes in on cancer cells, tags them with a fluorescent dye and kills them with heat. The all-in-one particle is one of the first examples from a growing field called “theranostics” that develops technologies physicians can use to diagnose and treat diseases in a single procedure.

The research is available online in the journal Advanced Functional Materials. Tests so far involve laboratory cell cultures, but the researchers said MRI tracking will be particularly advantageous as they move toward tests in animals and people.

“Some of the most essential questions in nanomedicine today are about biodistribution — where particles go inside the body and how they get there,” said study co-author Naomi Halas. “Noninvasive tests for biodistribution will be enormously useful on the path to FDA approval, and this technique — adding MRI functionality to the particle you’re testing and using for therapy — is a very promising way of doing this.”

Halas, Rice’s Stanley C. Moore Professor in Electrical and Computer Engineering and professor of chemistry and biomedical engineering, is a pioneer in nanomedicine. The all-in-one particles are based on nanoshells — particles she invented in the 1990s that are currently in human clinical trials for cancer treatment. Nanoshells harvest laser light that would normally pass harmlessly through the body and convert it into tumor-killing heat. Read more

Primary Endpoint Reached In Active Biotech’s TASQ Phase II Clinical Trial In Prostate Cancer Patients

A first analysis of the primary endpoint based on data from at least six months’ treatment of more than 200 patients, has been performed in Active Biotech AB’s (NASDAQ OMX Nordic: ACTI) ongoing Phase II clinical study of TASQ, in patients with asymptomatic, castrate resistant, metastatic prostate cancer.

In this analysis, safety, efficacy and certain biomarkers were evaluated. The primary endpoint, to show a difference in the number of patients with disease progression at six months, was reached. The fraction of patients with disease progression during the six month period was 43 % for patients treated with TASQ compared to 67 % for placebo treated patients. The median progression free survival was 24.7 weeks for the TASQ group, compared to 12.9 weeks (p=0.0001) for the placebo group. TASQ treatment also had a positive effect on several biomarkers relevant for prostate cancer progression and was generally well tolerated. No safety concerns significantly affecting the risk/benefit ratio for TASQ were identified.

“This is a very important milestone for TASQ and Active Biotech. I am looking forward to the further development of this novel, non-cytotoxic treatment. “, says Professor Tomas Leanderson, CEO Active Biotech “. Read more

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