Perjeta (pertuzumab): unprecedented success
New breast cancer drug prolongs life by almost a year and a half
Copper newsA new drug for the treatment of one of the most aggressive forms of breast cancer, developed by the Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche, prolongs the life of patients by an average of 16 months compared to the currently used methods of treatment. The results of the clinical trials, called "unprecedented" by experts, were presented at the annual Congress of the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO-2014) held this weekend in Madrid.
The third and final phase of the trials was designed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of the use of the drug Perjeta (pertuzumab) for the treatment of HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer. This form of malignant breast tumor, occurring in about 25-30 percent of cases, is associated with a mutation in the HER2 gene, leading to excessive production of the protein of the same name, which, in turn, is associated with the aggressiveness of the tumor, its spread to other parts of the body and an unfavorable prognosis. Currently, the standard method of treating such patients is the use of chemotherapy in combination with the drug "Herceptin" (trastuzumab).
The clinical trials involved 808 patients with diagnosed HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer who had not previously received therapy for this disease. Some of them received pertuzumab in combination with Herceptin and the chemotherapy drug Docetaxel, and some of them had the new drug replaced with a placebo.
As a result, it was found that patients who had pertuzumab added to the standard line of medications lived on average 15.7 months longer than the rest. In the first case, the statistical indicator of the average overall survival after diagnosis was 56.5 months (4 years 7 months), and in the second – 40.8 months (3 years 4 months).
Experts called the successes demonstrated by the new drug, which entered the US and European markets two years ago, "Phenomenal" and "unprecedented". The results of clinical trials, they suggest, suggest that the combination of Perjeta and Herceptin in combination with chemotherapy should become the standard of treatment for HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer.
Meanwhile, Perjeta is still extremely expensive – for example, in the UK, a 420-milligram bottle of the drug costs 2395 pounds, and the cost of a one-year course of therapy reaches 43 thousand pounds.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru29.09.2014