The American Society of Clinical Oncology Congress is being held in Chicago, United States. At the 5th meeting, a number of pharmaceutical companies and research institutions released new drugs and made new ideas for the treatment of cancer. Some drugs received clinical acclaim, and some treatments became the direction of future cancer treatment.
Delayed transfer
U.S. Amgen introduced the newly developed monoclonal antibody denosumab at the conference. Clinical trials have confirmed that this drug can effectively delay bone metastases in patients with advanced prostate cancer.
At this stage, drugs that prevent or delay the onset of bone metastases in patients with prostate cancer rely mainly on Zometa, a diphosphate drug produced by Swiss Novartis. In a comparative study of 1900 patients, denosumab was able to delay the onset of bone metastases by an average of 3.6 months compared with zoledronic acid.
At the same time, denosumab was confirmed by clinical trials to effectively curb the growth of myeloma.
When the prostate cancer develops to the late stage, bone metastasis of cancer cells generally occurs. More than 80% of late patients have bone metastasis. Common bone metastases can be seen in the jaws, vertebrae, ribs, and skulls.
At the conference, Amgen pointed out that not only prostate cancer but also denosumab can have the same effect on breast cancer, multiple myeloma and other solid tumors.
In the United States, denosumab was approved by the Food and Drug Administration last week and was marketed under the name Prolia, but at this stage it is only prescribed for the treatment of osteoporosis in postmenopausal women.
Inspire immunity
US Bristol-Myers Squibb introduced a new drug that is still in the experimental stage, saying that it can effectively prolong the lives of skin cancer patients, and is particularly effective for melanoma with the highest mortality rate in skin cancer.
Melanocarcinoma is a malignant cancer that results from melanocyte canceration in the pigmented areas of the skin, mucous membranes, eyes, and central nervous system. It is the fastest growing cancer in the past 30 years. At this stage, there is no effective therapy for melanoma cancer in the world. In the United States, about 6,000 people died of melanoma cancer throughout the year, with 25,000 new cases.
Via intravenous injection, Bristol-Myers Squibb’s monoclonal antibody drug, Ipilimumab, significantly extends the lives of patients with advanced melanoma, with 24% of patients extending their lives beyond 2 years.
Unlike traditional therapeutic principles, ipilimuma does not directly kill cancer cells, but instead stimulates the so-called virus killer T cells in the body's immune system. T cells kill cancerous cells.
Stephen Odaye, an expert on melanoma cancer at the Ingel Medical Research Institute in California, said that the advent of this drug is a milestone for humans in fighting cancer, and that urging the body's immune system to respond to cancerous cells is the new anti-cancer and anti-cancer strategy in the future. direction.
"For human cancer immunology, this is an exciting development," said Odai.
Contraction of tumor
Crezotinib, developed by Pfizer Pharmaceuticals Inc., has been clinically proven to effectively reduce the size of malignant tumors in patients with advanced gene mutations in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).
Non-small cell lung cancer is the most common type of lung cancer, accounting for 80% to 85% of all lung cancer patients, some of which are accompanied by genetic mutations. The population of genetically modified non-small cell lung cancer patients was mainly non-smokers and quitters. According to statistics from the World Health Organization, at this stage, 12 million lung cancer patients have been diagnosed every year in the world, and 8 million people have died of lung cancer each year.
Pang Yongjue, a doctor at Seoul National University School of Medicine in Seoul, said on the 5th that a phase 1 clinical trial confirmed that crizotinib is effective in 90% of patients with advanced gene mutations in non-small cell lung cancer, 57% of whom are After 8 weeks, the tumors contracted significantly.
The Associated Press reported that this drug is mainly aimed at genetic mutations in mutated genes, so as to reduce the effect of diseased cells.
Pfizer is currently conducting a phase III clinical trial of this drug to verify whether it can continue to shrink tumors, whether it is more effective than current chemotherapy, whether it can improve patient survival, rather than just verify that it can shrink the tumor. (Ling Xiao)