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At the beginning of December, the Food and Drug Administration approved Durvalumab (Imfinzi) – an immunotherapy drug – for the treatment of patients with limited stage small cell lung cancer, whose disease has not progressed following combined chemotherapy and radiotherapy regimen. Until recently, Durvalumab has been approved for small cell lung cancer patients with extensive disease only. The approval was based on results from a clinical trial in which 730 patients meeting the abovementioned criteria were randomly assigned to receive either Durvalumab as a single agent (study group 1), Durvalumab combined with another immunotherapy drug (study group 2), or placebo (control group). At the end of the predetermined follow-up period,

In the middle of September, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved treatment with Ribociclib (Kisqali), combined with hormonal therapy, also for early stage breast cancer patients with hormone receptor-positive HER2-negative tumors who have undergone surgery and are at high risk of recurrence (i.e. either with lymph node involvement, or if there is no nodal involvement, either with a tumor size ˃ 5 cm or a tumor size of 2 to 5 with high-grade features). Ribociclib is a type of targeted therapy. It is called “a cancer growth inhibitor”, since by its unique mechanism it interferes with the growth of cancer cells which are eventually destroyed. The approval was based

Recently, the World Health Organization published its 2022 estimates regarding incidence and mortality worldwide, for 36 cancers, in 185 countries. According to this data, there were close to 20 million new cancer cases in 2022 and almost 10 million cancer patients died of the disease. The estimates suggest that approximately one in five men or women develop cancer during their lifetime, whereas around one in nine men and one in twelve women die of the disease. Lung cancer was the most frequently diagnosed cancer, responsible for almost 2.5 million new cases (approx. 12.5% of all cancers globally), followed by female breast cancer (approx. 11.5% of all cancers globally), colorectal (approx.

In the middle of June, the Food and Drug Administration approved Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) in combination with chemotherapy, followed by Keytruda alone, for the treatment of patients with advanced or recurrent endometrial cancer.The approval was supported by results from a clinical trial enrolling 810 patients with advanced or recurrent endometrial cancer. Patients were randomly assigned to receive either Keytruda with chemotherapy, followed by Keytruda alone (study group), or placebo with chemotherapy, followed by placebo – same schedule (control group).At the end of the follow-up period, the study results pointed towards a significantly lower risk of disease progression among the study group patients, compared to the control group patients. Side effects associated

At the beginning of January, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the immunotherapy drug Pembrolizumab (Keytruda), in combination with chemoradiotherapy, for the treatment of patients with locally advanced cervical cancer who had not previously received any treatment. The approval was based on results from a clinical trial in which 596 patients meeting the abovementioned criteria were randomly assigned to receive either Pembrolizumab combined with chemoradiotherapy (study group), or placebo combined with chemoradiotherapy (control group). At the end of the predetermined follow-up period, results pointed towards a significantly lower risk of disease progression among the study group patients receiving Keytruda, compared to the control group receiving placebo. Side effects were

In the middle of December, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Enfortumab vedotin (Padcev) in combination with Keytruda (a type of immunotherapy) for the treatment of patients recently diagnosed with advanced or metastatic urothelial cancer. Padcev is an antibody-drug conjugate (an antibody attached to a chemotherapy agent).  The antibody delivers the chemotherapy drug directly to certain cancer cells. The approval was based on results from a clinical trial in which 886 patients meeting the abovementioned criteria were enrolled. Patients were randomly assigned to receive either Padcev combined with Keytruda (study group), or standard chemotherapy (control group). At the end of the follow-up period, results pointed towards a significantly lower