Australian researchers reported promising results with a new drug that shrinks brain tumors in melanoma patients. Their findings are published in The Lancet medical journal today.<\/p>\n
Medical researchers at Melanoma Institute Australia, Sydney’s Westmead Hospital and\u00a0Westmead Millenium Institute, and The University of Sydney say a new drug they have been\u00a0testing to treat deadly melanoma in the body also shows, for the first time, an ability to shrink\u00a0secondary tumours (metastases) in the brains of patients with advanced forms of the disease.<\/p>\n
They say the new drug can add months to the lives of patients whose melanoma has spread to\u00a0the brain. Most patients with brain metastases die within four months. The trial\u2019s results,\u00a0however, showed brain tumors in nine of the 10 patients shrank within the first six weeks. All 10\u00a0patients survived beyond five months, two patients survived beyond 12 months. One patient\u00a0was alive at 19 months.<\/p>\n
The drug called Dabrafenib works by targeting a gene mutation found in melanoma cancer,\u00a0called the BRAF mutation, which is present in 50 per cent of human melanomas. The drug\u00a0works by binding to the activated mutant form of the BRAF protein in the melanoma cell,\u00a0causing the cell to stop proliferating. In many cases it shrinks and disappears.<\/p>\n
The study focused on the most common BRAF gene mutation (V600E) and a particular type of\u00a0the BRAF mutation (V600K) that is common in Australians where cumulative UV exposure from\u00a0the sun is higher than in other parts of the world.<\/p>\n
The lead author of the study, Dr Georgina Long, from Melanoma Institute Australia, Westmead\u00a0Hospital and The University of Sydney, said, “This is the first evidence that we have a therapy\u00a0that helps prolong survival in patients with multiple melanoma brain metastases. The findings\u00a0are among the most important in the history of drug treatment for melanoma.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
“Currently there is no effective systemic treatment for melanoma brain metastases, and patients\u00a0whose cancer has spread to the brain are frequently excluded from promising clinical trials. Until\u00a0now, there has not been a single drug that has shrunk brain metastases in more than ten out of\u00a0100 patients with metastatic melanoma. This drug had a 90 per cent success rate in reducing\u00a0the size of brain metastases.<\/p>\n
\u201cBrain metastases in melanoma are a major unsolved problem. Until now, melanoma has been\u00a0notoriously resistant to drug therapy in general, and responses in highly lethal brain metastases\u00a0are particularly uncommon. Providing these early data are supported in larger cohorts of\u00a0patients, and durable responses are confirmed, this activity in the brain may assist in addressing\u00a0a large unmet need in patients with metastatic melanoma worldwide.\u00a0Historically, researchers\u00a0have been reluctant to concentrate on brain metastases because the survival period is so\u00a0short,\u201d Dr Long said.<\/p>\n
But Dr Long and Westmead Hospital specialist Professor Rick Kefford AM, who also leads\u00a0cancer research at the Westmead Millennium Institute for Medical Research and Melanoma\u00a0Institute Australia, lobbied hard to extend the trial to focus directly on people with brain\u00a0metastasis and the BRAF variation seen more commonly in Australia. They can take special\u00a0credit for this trial\u2019s success.<\/p>\n
WMI senior researcher Dr Helen Rizos is leading a team working on the next steps for these\u00a0drugs, which stop working after a time. Her team is defining mechanisms used by melanoma\u00a0tumours to survive in the presence of these drugs.\u201d<\/p>\n
With this information we can design \u00a0treatment strategies that can be used, often in combination with the initial drugs, to overcome\u00a0resistance.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Australian researchers reported promising results with a new drug that shrinks brain tumors in melanoma patients. Their findings are published in The Lancet medical journal today. Medical researchers at Melanoma Institute Australia, Sydney’s Westmead Hospital and\u00a0Westmead Millenium Institute, and The University of Sydney say a new drug they have been\u00a0testing to treat deadly melanoma in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":2446,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"default","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}}},"categories":[19],"class_list":["post-2479","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cat-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/2479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wimr.org.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}