New drug combination doubles survival for people with bladder cancer: Clinical trial

Results from a clinical trial show that a new combination of drugs doubles overall survival for patients with bladder cancer that has spread (metastatic bladder cancer).

The findings show that giving people with metastatic bladder cancer enfortumab vedotin (an antibody drug conjugate) and pembrolizumab (an immunotherapy drug) can stop their disease getting worse and helps them live twice as long compared to those given just chemotherapy.

These findings were presented at a plenary session at the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO) conference.

Life expectancy for people with metastatic bladder cancer is just one year, and the treatment they are given, chemotherapy, hasn't changed in 40 years. This new trial, called EV302, involved nearly 900 people aimed to change this and to develop the first new treatment for bladder cancer that has spread in nearly four decades.

The team found that the 442 people given this new combination of drugs (enfortumab vedotin and pembrolizumab) lived nearly twice as long compared to the 444 people given chemotherapy (31.5 vs. 16 months). In addition, the researchers showed that the risk of death was 53% lower in those given the combination, which was also associated with better disease control rates. And encouraging, side effects from the drug combination were very similar to those experienced by people given chemotherapy.

Professor Tom Powles said, "We've long known that we need to improve people's chances of surviving bladder. This study has achieved that in a dramatic manner. We've shown that combining these two drugs helped people live twice as long compared to those given standard chemotherapy, with unprecedented responses. There is new hope in bladder cancer, and I can't thank those who took part in the trial enough for doing so."

Both drugs, enfortumab vedotin (Pascev) and pembrolizumab (Keytruda), are available today and together, they reduce the risk of death 53% with seemingly no extra side effects over normal chemo.

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2 posted on 11/12/2023 12:03:45 PM PST by ConservativeMind (Trump: Befuddling Democrats, Republicans, and the Media for the benefit of the US and all mankind.)

Ping to interesting bladder cancer drug research.

3 posted on 11/12/2023 7:07:10 PM PST by Candor7 (( Ask not for whom THE Trump trolls...He trolls for thee!)<img src=""width=500></img>)

thanks for the ping...

5 posted on 11/13/2023 3:07:59 AM PST by Fred Nerks (Fair Dinkum!)

You are most welcome.

Wishing dotter well.

6 posted on 11/14/2023 3:27:18 AM PST by Candor7 (( Ask not for whom THE Trump trolls...He trolls for thee!)<img src=""width=500></img>)

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