ALK-positive

  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt:

    “On November 2, 2018, the Food and Drug Administration granted accelerated approval to lorlatinib (LORBRENA, Pfizer, Inc.) for patients with anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK)-positive metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose disease has progressed on crizotinib and at least one other ALK inhibitor for metastatic disease or whose disease has progressed on alectinib or ceritinib as the first ALK inhibitor therapy for metastatic disease.

    “Approval was based on a subgroup of 215 patients with ALK-positive metastatic NSCLC, previously treated with one or more ALK kinase inhibitors, enrolled in a non‑randomized, dose-ranging and activity-estimating, multi‑cohort, multicenter study (Study B7461001; NCT01970865). The major efficacy measures were overall response rate (ORR) and intracranial ORR, according to RECIST 1.1, as assessed by an independent central review committee.”

    Go to full article published by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Dec 14, 2018.

    If you’re wondering whether this story applies to your own cancer case or a loved one’s, we invite you to get support from Cancer Commons.

  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt from Targeted Oncology:

    “Adult patients with ALK-positive, locally advanced or metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who had not received a prior ALK inhibitor experienced a more than 50% reduction in the risk of disease progression or death with treatment with brigatinib (Alunbrig), compared with the first-line standard of care, crizotinib.

    “Brigatinib demonstrated superior progression-free survival (PFS) compared with crizotinib, corresponding to a 51% reduction in the risk of disease progression or death (HR, 0.49; 95% CI, 0.33-74; P = .0007), according to first interim analysis results presented at the 19th World Conference on Lung Cancer and simultaneously published in the New England Journal of Medicine.”

    Go to full article published by Targeted Oncology on Sep 26, 2018.

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  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt from Healio:

    “Brigatinib conferred substantial intracranial responses and durable PFS among patients with brain metastases and ALK-positive, non-small cell lung cancer previously treated with crizotinib, according to ongoing study results.

    ” ‘Crizotinib [Xalkori; Pfizer, EMD Serono], the first licensed ALK inhibitor, is very active but has clear central nervous system liability from poor CNS penetration. All of the next-generation ALK inhibitor drugs have started to show CNS efficacy consistent with their superior activity in the brain compared with crizotinib,’ D. Ross Camidge, MD, PhD, director of thoracic oncology at University of Colorado, told HemOnc Today. ‘The whole clinical trials field has had to evolve around these events in terms of how we should capture and present CNS data. Brigatinib [Alunbrig; Takeda Oncology, Ariad] was one of the drugs that helped with this.’ ”

    Go to full article published by Healio on July 25, 2018.

    If you’re wondering whether this story applies to your own cancer case or a loved one’s, we invite you to get support from Cancer Commons.

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    Lung Cancer Highlights from ASCO 2016

    Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    This year, the Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) did not produce any truly groundbreaking revelations about new treatments for lung cancer. However, researchers did report quite a few positive findings, and some disappointing ones.