Exelixis Zeroes in on Lead Drug, Sees Activity in the Bones of Prostate Cancer ...

Exelixis gambled a little more than a year ago, deciding to go “all-in” on its lead drug candidate for cancer after many investors lost interest in its strategy of building a broad pipeline with lots of different drugs.

It was risky thing to do in a business where most drugs fail in clinical trials, but it raised about $180 million on early data to support this idea back in March, and now more and more public data is rolling in to buttress the argument.

The South San Francisco-based biotech company (NASDAQ: EXEL ) has shown off results over the past several days from a trial that enrolled 490 patients with nine different tumor types, to see where cabozantinib (XL184) might work best. The latest batch of data for this drug, from 171 patients with prostate cancer, is being presented to doctors today at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) meeting in Chicago.

Exelixis has taken an unusual tack in the prostate cancer drug business, where drugs are primarily judged on whether they can help men live longer. In this early trial, Exelixis has focused on how its drug was able to partially or completely wipe out bone lesions for about three-quarters (82 of 108) patients whose prostate cancer had spread to the bones. Prostate cancer is notorious for migrating into bones and essentially splintering them from the inside out, causing intense pain and helping send many patients into a death spiral. About 30,000 men in the U.S. die of prostate cancer each year, and while promising advances have been made recently by Dendreon’s sipuleucel-T (Provenge) and Johnson & Johnson’s abiraterone (Zytiga), neither drug has primarily focused on an ability to preserve bones.

“For the first time, we have enough patients on the drug, long enough, to say ‘Wow, cabo resolves bone scans for almost 80 percent of patients, and you can see clinical benefit,’ ” says Exelixis CEO Mike Morrissey. “We have a lot of support from investigators, especially in prostate cancer. When metastatic prostate cancer goes to the bone, it drives pain, complications, fractures, spinal cord compression, anemia. Everything combined really puts the patient in a bad place. We have investigators who doing this for several decades who have never seen this level of activity in the bone. They are incredibly enthusiastic.

When they can not operate on a brain tumor what is the reasons ...

And spinal cord). Some brain tumors are inoperable because of their location; the tumor may be too deep, surrounded by nerves, or in an area close to arteries or veins. In these cases, operating on them would cause brain hemorrages (bleeding resulting in a major stroke or death), paralysis, cause the patient to be in a vegetative state, or cause them to die. Doctors ethically won’t don’t want to be the cause of the patient dying; it’s bad enough that the tumor is going to kill them. In other words, very few doctors would risk their license to kill a person. The life expectancy depends on the location of the tumor and on how fast it’s growing. It could be days, months, or years. It all depends.

Posted by Kuuipo Michelle In a nutshell…when a person has inoperable brain cancer it is due to the cancer having reached areas of the brain that if “cut” into would cause rapid metastases (spreading) or immediate death. The length of a persons life depends on treatment, their own body and a will to fight and live…I have seen people live anywhere from several days to several years.

Posted by LYNN IN FL Depends on the sort of tumor and how much damage such surgery may cause.

At one extreme, think about a benign tumor that isn’t growing and has no effect on the life of the person (maybe it just showed up on a scan after an accident). The surgeon may not consider that worth doing all the damage to get to it.

At the other extreme, think of a very malignant tumor that will spread if not removed. That might be worth the risks.

You should think of getting a second opinion at a major centre if you haven’t done so already .

Intramedullary spinal cord tumors

Spinal cord and spinal column tumors, principles and practice

Fundamentals of neurology, an illustrated guide

Collected Papers of the Mayo Clinic

Archives of neurology and psychiatry