The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved erlotinib tablets (Tarceva®; Genentech, Astellas Pharma), a once-daily, oral non-chemotherapy medicine for the initial or first-line treatment of people with metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose tumors have certain epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) activating mutations as detected by an FDA-approved test. In…

The pivotal Phase III clinical trial of L-BLP25 (formerly referred to as Stimuvax®) known as START did not meet its primary endpoint of an improvement in overall survival in patients with unresectable, locally advanced stage IIIA or stage IIIB non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The trial was conducted by Merck Serono, a division of Merck KGaA of Darmstadt,…

November is Lung Cancer Awareness Month. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death for both men and women in the United States. It has a five-year survival rate of only 15 percent. Often, lung cancers grow silently for many years and reach an advanced stage before causing symptoms that lead to diagnosis and treatment. But, there is some good news. Research from the National Cancer…

Tesaro, an oncology-focused biopharmaceutical company, announced earlier today that the first clinical trial of its proprietary Anaplastic Lymphoma Kinase (ALK) inhibitor, TSR-011, has, for the first time, been used in a patient at the Virginia G. Piper Cancer Center Clinical Trials at Scottsdale Healthcare, a partnership between Scottsdale Healthcare and the TGen, the Translational Genomics Research Institute. Virginia…

Detailed results from an exploratory, randomized Phase II study evaluating the combination of ficlatuzumab (AVEO Oncology), a HGF inhibitory antibody, and gefitinib (Iressa; AstraZeneca) compared to gefitinib monotherapy in previously untreated Asian subjects with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) were presented at…

Final results from PARAMOUNT trial, a Phase III clinical study of pemetrexed (Alimta®, Eli Lilly and Company) in the continuation maintenance setting, demonstrated improved overall survival in patients with advanced nonsquamous non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated with pemetrexed continuation maintenance. PARAMOUNT trial results were presented on Monday, June 4, 2012, at the 48th Annual Meeting of the American Society of…

Lung Cancer Alliance (LCA) President Laurie Fenton-Ambrose predicted that because of major breakthroughs this year in screening, treatment and research, 2011 will be defined as the turning point year for lung cancer.



"To paraphrase Churchill, this is not the end but it is certainly the beginning of the end," she said, "and 2011 will be remembered as the year that finally changed the course of lung cancer and led to thousands of lives being…

A new test may help lung cancer patient benefit from early, persoalized treatment option. The cobas EGFR Mutation Test, a real-time polymerase chain reaction-based diagnostic test that identifies 41 mutations across exons 18, 19, 20 and 21 of the EGFR gene using multiplex PCR chemistry developed by Roche Diagnostics, a division of F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd, is now CE marked for commercial availability in Europe and other countries…

Patients with recurrent metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) have a morbid prognosis, but a new epigenetic therapy may have potential for this population, according to data published in Cancer Discovery, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), the world’s oldest and largest professional organization dedicated to advancing cancer research.



A research team at…

Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc. announced this week that it has initiated the rolling submission of a New Drug Application (NDA) to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for crizotinib (PF-02341066), an oral first-in-class anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) inhibitor in development for the treatment of patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose tumors are ALK-positive. Pfizer expects to complete the submission in the first half of 2011.…