NIH Opening First Mesothelioma Clinical Trial for Lynparza

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland, is opening the first mesothelioma clinical trial involving the immunotherapy drug Lynparza (olaparib), a protein inhibitor and targeted therapy already used effectively with breast and ovarian cancers. The phase II clinical trial, for patients previously treated with standard chemotherapy, is designed to gauge the response rate in pleural and peritoneal mesothelioma. Mesothelioma specialist Dr. Raffit Hassan of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) is the senior investigator for the single-center trial, which hopes to enroll at least 40 patients. Earlier research at University of Florida Health — published in October 2017 in Cancer Chemotherapy and Pharmacology — showed an impressive ability of Lynparza and niraparib, a similar drug, to “induce synthetic lethality” in mesothelioma cell lines in the laboratory. Florida Testing Niraparib on Mesothelioma The University of Florida in Gainesville will be opening a clinical trial soon using niraparib with a variety of malignancies, including mesothelioma cancer. The NIH Clinical Center will be running its trial with Lynparza exclusively with mesothelioma, but parallel to the one at Florida. Both drugs are known protein inhibitors that target the same genetic mutation and offer a range of anti-tumor activity. With other cancers, both drugs have been most effective in treating patients with a mutation in the BRCA gene. The majority of patients with mesothelioma hav...
Source: Asbestos and Mesothelioma News - Category: Environmental Health Authors: Source Type: news