Article

Xalkori Shows Significant Benefit As First-Line in ALK-Positive NSCLC

The study, published in NEJM, found that PFS improved by nearly 4 months while ORR improved by nearly 30%.

Pfizer’s targeted cancer therapy Xalkori (crizotinib) significantly extended progression-free survival in previously-untreated patients with a particular form of non-small cell lung cancer taking part in a late-stage trial compared to chemotherapy alone.

Data from the Phase III PROFILE 1014 study, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, showed that patients with ALK-positive advanced NSCLC given Pfizer’s kinase inhibitor had a median PFS of 10.9 months compared to 7 months for those in the chemotherapy arm. Also, the objective response rate was much higher at 74% versus 45%, the firm noted.

On the safety side, no unexpected issues arose in the trial, with the most commonly reported adverse events observed in the Xalkori being vision disorder (71%), diarrohea (61%), nausea (56%) and oedema (49%), and with chemotherapy, nausea (59%), fatigue (38%), vomiting (36%) and decreased appetite (34%).

Link to the complete article: http://bit.ly/1FQ1zCA

Source: PharmaTimes

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