Women with advanced breast cancer are being sought to participate in an early phase study at UCLA's Jonsson Cancer Center that will test two biologically targeted compounds that seek to block the signals that cause cancers to grow.The study of the drug Herceptin, approved in 1998 by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration for use against advanced breast cancer, combined with the experimental compound OSI-774 (Tarceva) does not use standard treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation.
A pill taken once daily, OSI-774 is designed to block a growth receptor that prompts the excess cell proliferation associated with cancer. Herceptin is administered in weekly infusions and works in a similar way, but targets a different growth receptor, said Dr. Carolyn Britten, a UCLA Jonsson Cancer Center researcher and co-principal investigator in the study.
"This is a total biologic approach, and we hope it will be easier to tolerate than traditional therapies," said Britten, an assistant professor of hematology/oncology at UCLA.
Chemotherapy and radiation cause side effects such as fatigue, nausea, hair loss and low blood counts. Drugs that attack only cancer cells, called biologic or molecularly targeted therapies, often result in fewer side effects than conventional therapies, which kill all fast-growing cells.
The study seeks women with newly diagnosed breast cancer that has spread to other organs. Volunteers must have an overabundance in their tumor cells of a gene called HER-2/neu. About 30 percent of women with breast cancer -- 60,000 cases a year -- fall into that category.
"This is a first-of-its-kind study," said Dr. Mark Pegram, director of the Women's Cancer Program at UCLA's Jonsson Cancer Center and co-investigator of the study. "The scientific rationale is sound -- this boxes in cancers with a multi-pronged approach."
For more information or to volunteer for the study, patients should call the clinical trials hotline at 888-798-0719. - By Kim Irwin
[Contact: Kim Irwin, Kambra McConnel]
05-Feb-2002
