�Larger trials are requisite to further examine and confirm the early findings on the experimental drug abiraterone ethanoate (CB7630). Researcher Dr. Johann de Bono, from the Institute of Cancer Research and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust in the UK, who light-emitting diode two on-going clinical trials of CB7630, said larger studies ar necessary to find knocked out the efficacy of the drug.
"We believe we have made a major step onward in the treatment of end-stage prostate cancer patients," De Bono told BBC News. He, however, added that the phase 1 and 2 findings requisite to be confirmed in larger trials.
An oral and irreversible inhibitor of the enzyme CYP17 that decreases testosterone and DHT to insensible levels, CB7630 works by blocking the production of the hormones throughout the body.
The latest abiraterone study, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, is based on just 21 patients with advanced, aggressive prostate malignant neoplastic disease treated with the do drugs although data has been collected on a total of 250 patients in the US and the UK. The studies launch significant neoplasm shrinkage and a knock off in PSA in the majority of patients.
In an interview with Urosource, Prof. Fritz Schr�der of the Department of Urology, Erasmus MC, University Medical Centre Rotterdam, The Netherlands, called the latest CB7630 findings an "important and exciting growing" in on-going research concerning androgen-independent prostate gland cancer (AIPC), but reiterated the aspect that there are placid some key questions that require further studies and which bathroom only be answered in larger trials.
In a paper published in the latest number of European Urology, Schr�der said that based on recent findings it is "evident that enzymes related to androgen metabolism that are over-expressed in AIPC could be targets for endocrine treatment." He said CBT7630 is a late example.
Per-Anders Abrahamsson, Secretary-General of the EAU, said arbiraterone acetate targets a group of patients that are notoriously hard to treat, adding that it would be a breakthrough if abiraterone can fulfill the promises of the initial information.
"Caution is indeed in order and it is too early to sanction too a lot excitement and raise expectations amongst patients just yet," said Abrahamsson.
Professor David Webb, an expert in clinical pharmacology at the University of Edinburgh, besides said in a BBC News interview that although abiraterone acetate rayon "clearly looks promising�it is still at the early stages of clinical development."
"It will be crucial to look carefully at the balance between its benefits and harms, in front drawing immobile conclusions just about the usefulness of this new do drugs," said Webb. "Important side effects often only emerge with the larger clinical studies that now indigence to be done."
Abiraterone, developed by the US-based Cougar Biotechnology (Los Angeles, California), is now existence readied for phase 3 trials planetary.
European Association of Urology
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