Avastin study on pancreatic cancer effects mixed results

ZURICH , Switzerland A new late-stage study of Roche Holding’s Avastin, and its effectiveness to slow down or avert pancreatic cancer in patients, had mixed results, the company said Tuesday.

The Swiss drugmaker said that although the addition of its drug to a Tarceva-chemotherapy combination failed to prolong the lives of patients with advanced pancreatic cancer, certain subjects did have some benefits when using Avastin.

Roche said that the study, which included 607 patients, showed that adding Avastin prolonged the time patients lived without their cancer worsening, as well as adding safety benefits.

An earlier trial, the company said, utilizing the same experiment, concluded that the addition of Avastin had shown no benefit in the treatment of pancreatic cancer.

Roche, which sponsored the study known as AVITA, plans to further analyze the data to determine the extent of the benefit of adding Avastin to the Tarceva-chemotherapy combination. The new details that surfaced from the study will not be published, the drugmaker said.

Pancreatic cancer, deemed the most difficult form of cancer to treat, is frequently resistant to chemotherapy and radiotherapy, and tends to spread quickly to other parts of the body. It leads to the shortest life expectancy of any major tumor.

Avastin, which hinders the growth of tumors by restraining their blood supply, was jointly developed with Genentech, a U.S. biotechnology company (majority-owned by Roche), and is seen as one of Roche’s most important drugs.

Financial experts believe Avastin will eventually become Roche’s best-selling drug, according to Dow Jones, since the drug is expected to be approved to treat several types of cancers.

Avastin was first approved in the U.S. in 2004 for the treatment of advanced colorectal cancer, and was approved for the treatment of lung cancer one year later. It is currently awaiting sanction for use in breast cancer. In Europe, it won approval for the treatment of advanced breast cancer and lung cancer earlier this year.