Mesothelioma Lawyers

Author: Govt

Researchers with the largest phase III trial

to date for mesothelioma, an aggressive cancer affecting the lining of

the lung, reported results showing that patients on a new chemotherapy

drug regimen

live longer and have less pain than those on an older drug. The

findings were announced at the annual meeting of the American Society

of Clinical Oncology meeting in Orlando, Fla., on May 20, 2002.

Pemetrexed

(brand name AlimtaŸ) is a novel antifolate, a class of drugs that

targets the folic acid metabolic pathway, which effects availability of

certain B complex vitamins. The results of the trial show that tumors

shrank in 41 percent of patients on pemetrexed in combination with a

more commonly used chemotherapy agent called cisplatin.

Only 17 percent of patients receiving cisplatin alone experienced tumor

shrinkage. Additionally, those on the pemetrexed combination lived

nearly three months longer than those on cisplatin alone.

According

to lead author, Nicholas J. Vogelzang, M.D., University of Chicago

Cancer Research Center, "This is the largest clinical trial ever

conducted in this disease and the 25 to 30 percent improvement in

survival for patients on the combination therapy is the first time

anyone has documented a significant improvement in patients treated for

mesothelioma."

Malignant pleural mesothelioma is associated with a history of asbestos

exposure in about 70 to 80 percent of all cases and there is no

approved or very effective chemotherapy for the disease. Researchers

hypothesized that pemetrexed....[MORE]