According to a story from BioPortfolio, the biopharmaceutical company AVEO Pharmaceuticals and the lung cancer diagnostic company Biodesix recently released the results from the Phase Ib clinical trial testing a combination treatment for acute myeloid leukemia. This combination includes AVEO’s ficlatuzumab (classified as an inhibitor of hepatocyte growth factor) and cytarabine. The results of this trial were first presented at 2019 Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR).
About Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML)
Acute myeloid leukemia, also known as acute myelogenous leukemia, is a type of blood cancer which affects myeloblasts, stem cells that would normally develop into myeloid white blood cells. There are a number of risk factors for acute myeloid leukemia, including other blood disorders such as myelodysplastic syndrome, family history, certain genetic variants, chemical exposure (including chemotherapy agents), and radiation. Symptoms include an increased risk of infection, easy bruising and bleeding, fatigue, shortness of breath, fever, weight and appetite loss, anemia, and bone/joint pain. Treatment for this cancer is most often chemotherapy or stem cell transplant; there are very limited options for patients with relapsed disease. The five year survival rate for acute myeloid leukemia is only 27 percent in the US. There is a clear need for more effective treatments for this cancer. To learn more about acute myeloid leukemia, click here.
About The Trial
The treatment was tested in patients with disease that was relapsed or refractory to first line treatment and was considered high risk. A serious prognostic factor for certain cancers, include acute myeloid leukemia, is the concentration of serum hepatocyte growth factor (HGF). Patients that display high levels of HGF generally tend to have poor outcomes and survival. Research has shown the cancer cells release HGF and the inhibition of this activity could make these cells more vulnerable to death.
The study included a total of 18 patients. 12 of these patients received the greatest tolerable dose of the therapy and half of them saw a complete response. Nine patients in total achieved a complete response. These results suggest that the combination of ficlatuzumab and cytarabine could have a meaningful impact on outcomes for patients, but there were also some serious adverse events reported, including electrolyte disturbances and febrile neutropenia. One patient was also forced to withdraw from the study because of a serious gastrointestinal bleed, which researchers determined may have been related to treatment with ficlatuzumab.
More research of this combination with a greater number of acute myeloid leukemia patients will help determine if this combination will have a future role in treating this rare blood cancer.
