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A new analysis may help doctors identify breast cancer patients who will benefit from treatment with the immunesuppressant drug everolimus, say French researchers at the 4thIMPAKT Breast Cancer Conference in Brussels, Belgium. Everolimus is currently used as an immunosuppressant to preventpatients rejecting transplanted organs and in the treatment ofrenal cell cancer . Research is also being conducted into the drug's use in othercancers, including breast cancer. Dr Thomas Bachelot, from Centre Leon Berard in Lyon and colleaguesanalyzed data from the TAMRAD study, published two years ago[1].This was the first study to show that in patients whose cancerprogressed after treatment with the aromatase inhibitor drugtamoxifen, the time-to-progression could be delayed by the additionof everolimus. The new study aimed to identify which biological characteristics ofthe patient's primary tumor could be used to identify those forwhom everolimus would be most effective. "This is of greatimportance, as everolimus is quite toxic and you don't want to givethis drug if you're not sure the patient will benefit from it," DrBachelot explained. "The interesting thing is that we did not find what we expected,"Dr Bachelot said. The researchers had hypothesized that patientswho would benefit the most from this treatment would be those withhigh expression levels of phosphatidylinositol 3-kinases (orPI3Ks), a family of enzymes involved in cellular functions such ascell growth and proliferation. "But the opposite seems to be true," Dr Bachelot said. In patientswith low PI3K levels, median time-to-progression exceeded 30months, while in those with high levels, median survival was 6.4months. "At the same time, we also found that the low expression of aprotein that normally block mTOR activation, LKB1, was associatedwith a good response to everolimus, while patients with normallevels of this protein did not have the same good response. Thoseresults suggest that patients with an activation of mTOR that isnot dependent on PI3K are the ones who may benefit the most fromeverolimus." "These are exiting results, as they may allow for a betterselection of patients who should receive this very effective butsometimes toxic drug," Dr Bachelot said. The results need to bevalidated on an independent and larger cohort of patients beforeany definitive conclusion can be reached, he noted. The researchershope this will be done in coming months. Commenting on the study which he was not involved in, Dr Angelo DiLeo, from Hospital of Prato, Italy, former IMPAKT Co-Chair, said:"These are very attractive results, but still preliminary. For thetime being we do not have molecular markers that can be used inclinical practice to select patients candidate to this treatment.It will be important to test the identified markers of response toeverolimus, in particular PI3K, in the context of the recentlypresented large phase-III trials." Additional References Citations. The e-commerce company in China offers quality products such as EDM Wire Cutting Machine Manufacturer , Copper Annealing Furnace Manufacturer, and more. For more , please visit Winding Machines today!
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