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Studies suggest 'clinical benefits' of AZ lung cancer drug
19 Nov 2008
Clinical Research
AstraZeneca (AZ) says its cancer drug Zactima (vandetanib) has demonstrated "clinical benefits" in phase-three trials.
The company said results from the Zodiac and Zeal studies had shown that the addition of the drug to chemotherapy prolonged progression-free survival and led to greater tumour shrinkage in patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).
However the Zest trial, which evaluated the efficacy of Zactima 300 milligrams (mg) compared to erlotinib 150 mg, did not meet its primary objective of demonstrating a statistically significant extension of progression-free survival with Zactima.
John Patterson, AZ's executive director for development, commented that NSCLC is a "truly debilitating" disease.
He continued: "These studies have shown that vandetanib can offer clinical benefit to patients with lung cancer ."
Merck KGaA has just reported positive data from a phase-three study of its drug Erbitux in the treatment of NSCLC.
The firm said that patients who were given Erbitux in addition to standard first-line platinum-based chemotherapy lived "significantly longer" than patients given chemotherapy alone.
