Velcade Tops Standard Blood Cancer Treatment

Millennium Pharmaceuticals Inc.’s cancer drug Velcade improves the survival rate of patients suffering a relapse of multiple myeloma, a form of bone marrow cancer, researchers said on Saturday.

The 327 patients given Velcade lived longer on average than 330 patients receiving dexamethasone, a current standard treatment. And it took longer for their cancer to worsen, the researchers told a meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology in New Orleans. Thirteen cancer patients on Velcade died during the study compared with 24 on dexamethasone, and the time by which symptoms worsened was 5.7 months for those on Velcade compared with 3.6 months for the others, the researchers said. Velcade, known generically as bortezomib, was also found to be less toxic than dexamethasone, said the researchers, whose study was funded by Millennium. Dr. Paul Richardson of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, who led the study, called the results “very striking.” It is the first time researchers presented data from the study, but the company had announced last month that the trial was halted because Velcade met its objectives in increasing survival rates. About 15,000 new cases of multiple myeloma are diagnosed annually and 12,000 people die from it per year, Richardson said at news briefing. Velcade had received expedited U.S. marketing approval in 2003 as a multiple myeloma treatment based on Phase II data presented last year. The drug is under study for treating non-small cell lung cancer, colorectal cancer, melanoma and metastatic breast cancer. The study has the potential to help broaden the labeling of Velcade and allow the drug to be used to treat about 50 percent of cases of multiple myeloma from 25 percent, said Dr. David Schenkein, vice president of clinical oncology development at Millennium . Multiple myeloma is a cancer of blood cells that destroys bone. The cells grow uncontrollably in the bone marrow and occasionally other parts of the body, suppressing development of normal white blood cells, red blood cells and platelets. Velcade inhibits the proteosome, an enzyme complex that exists in all cells, by shutting off the supply of proteins that the cancer cells need to survive. Richardson said the drug may work in ways not yet determined. Richardson said the data is likely to result in earlier use of Velcade in patients with relapsed multiple myeloma, but further analysis of the results will be necessary.(Source: American Society of Clinical Oncology: Reuters Health News: June 2004)