Recently, Laboratories Amgen and its subsidiary Onyx Pharmaceuticals, reported that they are working on two new molecules that have produced good results for patients with hemato-oncological diseases (blood cancers), such as acute lymphoblastic leukemia and multiple myeloma, which have a high incidence and recurrence in Mexico.
Under the 56th American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting, the pharmaceutical announced that their drugs Blinatumomab and Carfilzomib will allow treating these conditions, helping to prolong patients’ survival.
Based on the clinical testing, both drugs met the primary assessment protocols, as they demonstrated their ability to extend patients’ lifetime without disease progression (i.e. without the patient getting worse).
The evaluation of the recently approved in Mexico Carfilzomib included in addition to survival extension: overall response rate, disease control rate and quality of life in terms of health and safety.
Amgen specified that this molecule, used as therapy for myeloma patients, increase survival rates up to 26.3 months, compared with others that only allowed a survival increase of 17.6 months, yielding a difference of 8.7 month.
In this regard, Antonio Palumbo, head of the Myeloma Unit at the University of Torino’s Oncology Department in Italy, noted the need for such tools that, besides increasing the length of time without disease progression, would also improve the treatment’s depth and duration of response.
The pharmaceutical explained about Blinatumomab that this immunotherapy eradicated residual disease at molecular level in approximately 98 percent of those affected, and only during the first treatment cycle.
Therefore, patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia who underwent a transplant of allogeneic hematopoietic stem cells, prior to their treatment, achieved a partial or total disease remission.
According to Amgen experts, this is the first immunotherapy focused on this type of cancer, which uses an antibody to activate cells known as T lymphocytes. These types of cells are responsible for killing cancer cells, allowing counteracting the disease.
Finally, they explained the importance of these two molecules for treating to these hemato-oncological diseases, which require specific treatments due to their incidence.
In the case of Mexico, multiple myeloma has an incidence of at least 2,500 new cases per year. This figure places Mexico as the country with the highest number of cases in Latin America. This is why it is very important to develop effective therapies.
Through: Notimex
