Drugs cocktail offers melanoma hope
Updated on 03 June 2007
A new drugs cocktail offers hope to patients with metastatic melanoma, one of the deadliest cancers known.
Skin cancer that has spread around the body is notoriously difficult to treat. It responds badly to chemotherapy and patients in which the disease is confirmed usually live no longer than six to 12 months.
The new treatment combines two chemotherapy drugs, paclitaxel and carboplatin, with an agent that blocks the growth of blood vessels. Results of a phase II clinical trial showed that the drug combination delayed tumour growth by almost six months.
Typically metastatic melanoma starts spreading again eight weeks after chemotherapy treatment.
Although the study only involved 53 patients, doctors say the findings are significant.
Dr Svetomir Markovic, one of the US scientists from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, said: "This is the most effective treatment we have ever tested for this type of cancer."
However he said the results still had to be validated.
Study leader Dr Domingo Perez, who presented the findings at the American Association of Clinical Oncology meeting in Chicago, said: "The clinical benefit may be small, but in the world of melanoma where there is very little progress, this is certainly a strong indication that the combination of chemotherapy with an anti-angiogenic agent may be a valid treatment strategy for these patients."
Tumours cannot thrive without being nourished by a network of blood vessels which they create for themselves. The agent in the new treatment, bevacizumab, blocks a natural "growth factor" substance that stimulates the formation of new blood vessels.
In the trial, all 53 patients were treated with the three drugs. Researchers found that the treatment was well tolerated. Around 8,000 new cases of malignant melanoma are diagnosed each year in the UK, leading to more than 1,800 deaths.
These news feeds are provided by an independent third party and Channel 4 is not responsible or liable to you for the same.
