ASCO 2009 - PARP Inhibitors show promise with triple-negative metastatic breast cancer

On May 31st, the results of a randomized Phase II study of biotech BiPar's new PARP inhibitor BSI-201 were presented at a plenary session of ASCO, the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the premier scientific conference attended by over 30,000 cancer doctors from around the world. Only a very few scientific presentations from among the more than 4,000 offered at this conference get highlighted at the plenary sessions at ASCO each year, so we knew this one would be important.

This study compared Gemzar and Carboplatin with and without BSI-201 in women with triple-negative metastatic breast cancer as either the first chemo for metastatic disease, or after one or two prior chemo regimens. PARP inhibitors target a gene responsible for DNA repair, and in these women's tumors, the gene was found to be overexpressed. BiPar, recently purchased by Sanofi-Aventis--which will market the drug when it is approved--had announced interim safety data from this trial at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, finding no additional signigicant toxicity attributed to the experimental drug.

Women with triple negative metastatic breast cancer should be on the lookout for a Phase III trial of this drug very soon at www.ClinicalTrials.gov According to the BiPar website this clinical trial will be in first-, second- and third-line triple negative breast cancer, and all patients in the trial will have an opportunity for access to BSI-201 at some point in the study.