New drug much better than Herceptin
New drug much better than Herceptin Hi Ladies
There is a new drug out there by Glaxo called Lapatinib which is better than Herceptin!!!
Please read the link below.
This drug is the future.
I’m actually on this drug trial and was chosen for the Capecitabine arm of the trial only and was totally devastated I’d not got the two. Now, the drug company has halted the recruitment and is now giving all patients on the trial who were chosen for the single agent the new drug Lapatinib. It is not yet a licensed drug and will be a couple of years before it can be prescribed.
Love to all
Julie
x
I have heard about this drug, not in detail but one of my family members is always surfing for new trials/treatments and has connections in the US where many drugs are used before we get them - and these results do sound good.
I hope you get the best from it, it bodes well that everyone has now been given the drug whichever arm they were on.
Take care
Steph x
That’s great, Julie I know you were really down about being selected for the control arm and when I read about the Lapatinib trial closing early I was sort of hoping that they would give everyone in the control arm the new drug. I am so glad that that’s what they decided to do. I hope it works brilliantly for you.
It is probably best to mention that this drug is, at present, only available on trials and it will be a while until it is licenced (I’ve read that GSK plans on putting an application in the second half of 2006). There are ‘named patient’ procedures for getting unlicenced drugs, but it’s alot of work. Of course, when it is licenced, it will be licenced for secondary breast cancer and it will be a while before it is licenced for primary breast cancer. Just don’t want to get people too overexcited.
There seems to be alot of good stuff in the pipeline right now.
Best wishes,
Christine
Wonderful news I read your post when you hadn’t been selected for the new drug and I’m just so pleased that you now have been moved on to it.
Thanks for the additional info Christine. I’m also a little confused as for whom the drug is appropriate. The little I read, implied that it was only tested on HER2 + people, but this might be expanded into trials on HER2 - people as well?
As Christine says, early days but always nice to hear of new things in the pipeline.
Again, well done and take care
Roberta
xx
Lapatinib Drug has 2 actions one on HER2 (hence the use here). The other on EGRF which the company describe as “being expressed by several solid tumours”
drugdevelopment-technology.com/projects/lapatinib/
pcpoh.bham.ac.uk/publichealth/horizon/PDF_files/2005reports/Lapatinib.pdf
What I read was that this drug has been trialled in her2+ breast cancer in patients with mets. for whom herceptin has failed. Apparently it has been shown to prolong survival by 2 months compared to those not taking the drug.
Another incremental improvment for some but no cure, no miracle.
Jane
There are other promising drugs, though, too I think it is important to keep in mind that this is just one promising drug. It’s not even the only one targeting her2 (since there are some very promising vaccines to prevent recurrence). Anyway, lest Jane think that nothing good ever happens to triple negatives, I thought I would mention these other drugs.
tesmilifene: a chemopotentiator. It added 8 months to the lives of women with secondaries (15 to 23 months) when it was given with doxorubicin and could be used to break drug resistance with taxanes as well. This has already been approved in the U.S. There is also a stronger taxane coming out (also already approved in the U.S.), but it causes lots of neuropathy.
BZL101: just out of stage one, but it stabilised the disease in 3/16 women for over six months with minimal side effects. It is derived from a member of the mint family, so I would hope that it would be less expensive than something like avastin.
new drugs Christine, Thank you for this - It is worrying the way in which people lock onto media announcements as if the new drug was going to be the great breakthrough, when so often it is only relevant to a narrow band of patients. There is so much research being done all over the world , and some of the ways forward are truly fascinating. The problem for us is that it takes so long for the tests to be completed.
Maybe BCC should have a section under Information listing all the trials and research plans currently in hand. That would be of great interest.
Thanks Ladies Hi Ladies
Thanks for your replies.
ChristineMH: your information is helpful and will read up on these when I have a minute or so.
SLP11: Will also read your link when i have a min.
JaneRA : I think the 2 month window you gave was with the drug as a single agent, proloned survival has been proven when Lapatinib has been added to Capecitabine chemotherapy. I don’t have the increased survival times available as these have not been published but what has been published is that survival time is 50% more. If you’ve been given 12 months, hopefully with this drug you’ll have 18 months of being on the planet rather than being in it!
Roberta: The drug has been tested on patients who are shown to be Her2 positive. I’ve been told there are 4 enzymes surrounding the cancer cell and they have discovered what Her2 does and they produced Herceptin and this acts on the Her2 enyzme of the cancer cell, Lapatinib works on both the Her1 and Her2 enzyme of the cell. They know what Her3 does and are producing drugs for the 3 enzymes, however they are still in the dark about Her4 enzyme, they are not sure what that does. Once this has been discovered, hopefully for patients who are HER pos, cancer may become a chronic disease and treated that way, like diabetes, I know it sounds far fetched but it was how it was explained to me by my Onc in layman’s terms.
Phoebe: I think it would be a good idea if BCC could have a new topic with your suggestions.
Thanks again ladies for your info and views.
Julie