Sept 3 (Reuters) – AbbVie said on Thursday its therapy for a type of blood cancer has improved patients’ response rate to treatment and reduced the risk of disease progression or death, meeting the main goals of a late-stage trial.
As biosimilars chip away at sales of its arthritis treatment Humira, once its top-selling drug, the company is turning to acquisitions and other disease areas such as neuroscience and oncology to drive growth.
The therapy, etentamig, showed an objective response rate (ORR) of 74% in patients with refractory multiple myeloma, higher than the 45.7% recorded by standard treatments chosen by the trial investigator. ORR is the percentage of patients in a clinical trial whose cancer shrinks or disappears after treatment.
It also increased survival without progression of the disease and reduced the risk of the cancer worsening or death by 60% compared to other treatments in the 393-patient trial.
The trial included patients who received a median of three prior lines of treatment with relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma, a form of blood cancer that has returned after a period of remission or has stopped responding to treatment.
After 12 months, 87.9% of patients receiving etentamig were still alive, compared to 72% of patients receiving standard treatments.
Etentamig engages T-cells, which protect from infections and fight cancer, by targeting two proteins. Patients on the therapy received a smaller first dose to reduce side effects, followed by treatment once every four weeks.
Cytokine release syndrome, an inflammatory immune reaction associated with T-cell therapies, occurred in 28.3% of patients given the step-up dose. Less patients on etentamig discontinued treatment due to treatment-emergent adverse events, the company said.
Detailed results from the trial are scheduled to be presented at the International Myeloma Society meeting in Glasgow later this month, AbbVie said.
(Reporting by Puyaan Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar)
