Women living and working in places with higher levels of fine particle air pollution are more likely to get breast cancer than those living and working in less polluted areas. Results of the first study to take account of the effects of both residential and workplace exposure to air pollution on breast cancer risk are presented at the ESMO Congress 2023 in Madrid, Spain. Professor Béatrice Fervers, Head of Prevention Cancer Environment Department, Léon Bérard Comprehensive Cancer Centre, France, said, “Our data showed a statistically significant association between long term exposure to fine particle air pollution, at home and at work, and risk of breast cancer. This contrasts with previous research which looked only at fine particle exposure where women were living, and showed small or no effects on breast cancer risk.” In the study, home and workplace exposure to pollution in 2419 women with breast cancer was compared to ...
Researchers at The Institute of Cancer Research (ICR), London, have discovered a way to use a simple, non-invasive MRI scan to determine whether an experimental approach to enhance treatment for breast cancer is effective. New research from the study, funded by Cancer Research UK, could help doctors visualise tumours and speed up the development of targeted therapies for breast cancer. If successful, these drugs could enhance the effectiveness of other drugs administered in combination. Common features of breast cancer include excessive connective tissue, which consists of cells and fibres that provide a scaffold, known as the extracellular matrix (ECM), where tumours can grow. Hyaluronic acid, which works by absorbing water, is naturally present inside the tumour ECM and causes cancer tumours to swell, making it challenging for drugs to penetrate, reach and destroy cancer cells. Researchers are able to use experimental drugs that target and degrade a chemical called hyaluronic ...
By Kate Goodwin Pictured: 3D rendering of antibody-drug conjugate/iStock, Love Employee BioNTech’s licensed antibody-drug conjugate is moving on to Phase III testing in a potential effort to challenge AstraZeneca and Daiichi Sankyo’s blockbuster Enherto in a heavily treated breast cancer subpopulation. DualityBio, BioNTech’s partner and the ADC’s creator, posted the trial plans Wednesday. BioNTech added the ADC, DB-1303, to its portfolio in April 2023 when it paid China’s DualityBio $170 million upfront for rights to it plus a second preclinical asset. Another $1.5 billion is on the line in milestone payments, plus tiered royalties. DB-1303 will be pitted against chemotherapy in the open-label Phase III for patients with HER2-low, HR+ metastatic breast cancer patients whose disease has progressed despite endocrine therapy. ADC therapy is like a targeted missile for cancer, with an antibody targeted to deliver the cancer killing payload. DB-1303 is a topoisomerase-1 inhibitor. Phase I/II trial results showed ...
The University of Oxford’s Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences has successfully developed a new model to predict the likelihood of a person developing and dying of breast cancer within ten years. The new risk-based screening model works to identify those at the highest risk of deadly cancers. Despite the ability of breast cancer screening to reduce deaths, it can sometimes lead to unnecessary treatments due to overdiagnosis when innocuous tumours are detected. In the UK, for every 10,000 women aged 50 years invited to breast screening for the next 20 years, 43 breast cancer deaths will be prevented, but 129 will be overdiagnosed. Researchers analysed anonymised data from 11.9 million women aged 20 to 90 years between 2000 and 2020 from the OResearch database. The team tested four different modelling techniques to predict breast cancer mortality risk: two traditional statistical-based models and two artificial intelligence (AI) models, all ...
Pfizer is shelling out $43 billion to acquire Seagen primarily for the Seattle biotech’s antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) capabilities. But a trial win for a small-molecule cancer drug makes the deal more attractive. Seagen on Wednesday said a phase 3 trial testing a combination of its Tukysa and Roche’s Kadcyla has hit its main goal in patients with previously treated HER2-positive breast cancer. Compared with Kadcyla and placebo, the combo significantly reduced the risk of tumor progression or death, Seagen said. Data on patient survival remain immature. Seagen plans to share the detailed results from the HER2CLIMB-02 trial at a medical meeting and will discuss them with the FDA, the company’s R&D chief, Roger Dansey, said in a statement. The positive results further de-risk the Seagen acquisition by Pfizer, Leerink Partners analysts said in a Wednesday note. Since securing FDA approval in 2020, Tukysa has been used alongside trastuzumab (Herceptin) and ...
By Connor Lynch Pictured: Cancer patient in bed looking out window/iStock, Ridofranz Biotech Seagen announced promising Phase III results Wednesday for its tyrosine kinase inhibitor Tukysa (tucatinib), in combination with Genentech’s antibody-drug conjugate Kadcyla (ado-trastuzumab emtansine), which met its primary endpoint of progression-free survival in HER-2 breast cancer patients. The HER2CLIMB-02 trial was investigating the efficacy of Tukysa in combination with Genentech’s Kadcyla to treat locally advanced or metastatic HER-2 breast cancer that had received previous treatment with taxane and trastuzumab. While the trial met the primary endpoint of PFS, the study’s data on its secondary endpoint of overall survival “were not yet mature,” Seagen Chief Medical Officer Roger Dansey said in a statement. The combination arm of the trial also resulted in more discontinuation “due to adverse events,” but also noted that “no new safety signals emerged for the combination.” Serious adverse reactions occurred in the study in 26% ...
Researchers have found a possible explanation as to why higher breast density and older age increase the risk of breast cancer. In an innovative study, researchers at the Turku Bioscience Centre, InFLAMES Flagship of the University of Turku, and Turku University Hospital, Finland, have made an extraordinary discovery that turns conventional wisdom on its head. Their findings reveal that healthy fat cells in the breast, also known as adipocytes, secrete a potent factor called IGFBP2, which acts as a barrier against invasive breast cancer progression. Dr. Emilia Peuhu (Study Key Collaborator) said, “Adipocytes generally get a bad rap for promoting cancer progression, but this study demonstrates that healthy breast fat can play a protective role in the maintenance of tissue homeostasis and cancer containment. It’s time to re-evaluate our assumptions and recognize the important role of these unsung heroes.” Breast cancer patients who experience the transition ...
Sacituzumab govitecan, a novel antibody drug-conjugate therapy was granted accelerated approval on February 3, 2023 by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the treatment of metastatic HR+, HER2- breast cancer. The FDA action was based on the results of TROPICS-02, a study in which Dana-Farber Cancer Institute’s Sara Tolaney, MD, MPH, helped lead and which was presented at the European Society of Medical Oncology annual meeting in September 2022 as well as the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting in June 2022. Researchers reported that the sacituzumab govitecan produced a statistically significant improvement in overall survival rates compared to chemotherapy. The overall survival rate for patients taking part in the global phase 3 study was 14.4 months for those who received sacituzumab govitecan and 11.2 for those given chemotherapy. The sacituzumab arm of the study also showed superior response rates as well as prolonged median progression free survival ...
Advanced or metastatic estrogen receptor-positive (ER+) breast cancer is commonly treated with drugs that block the estrogen receptor. However, estrogens that stimulate the receptor can also be effective. Building on their previous studies, researchers at Dartmouth Cancer Center recently concluded a Phase II clinical trial aimed to test the efficacy of alternating between estrogen stimulation and estrogen deprivation in patients with metastatic ER+ breast cancer, and to identify tumor characteristics that predict who might benefit from this strategy. The results, newly published ahead of print in Clinical Cancer Research, support cyclical estrogen/anti-estrogen therapy as a promising strategy to treat advanced/metastatic ER+ breast cancer. The POLLY trial stands for “Phase II study of Pre-emptive oscillation of ER activity levels through alternation of estradiol/anti-estrogen therapies prior to disease progression in ER+/HER2- metastatic or advanced breast cancer.” Among 19 patients enrolled in the trial, 3 (16%) experienced tumor shrinkage during cyclical treatment and ...
Many cancer therapies do not produce the hoped-for results. A common reason for this is that the tumors develop resistance to the medications. This is the case, for example, with alpelisib, a drug that has been approved for use in Switzerland for the past few years as a treatment for advanced breast cancer. A research group at the Department of Biomedicine of the University of Basel has now discovered that the loss of the neurofibromin 1 (NF1) gene leads to a reduced response to alpelisib. The researchers also found that the dietary supplement N-acetylcysteine restores the sensitivity of cancer cells to this treatment. The findings have been published in the journal Cell Reports Medicine on April 11. Loss of gene triggers resistance At the moment, patients with advanced and metastatic breast cancer lack effective treatment options. The PI3K signaling pathway is often overactive in breast cancer due to mutations promoting tumor ...
Go to Page Go
your submission has already been received.
OK
Please enter a valid Email address!
Submit
The most relevant industry news & insight will be sent to you every two weeks.