Revolutionary drug could help thousands of patients with genetic cancers

A pioneering treatment for genetic cancers which could help thousands of patients is being developed by British scientists.

The drug, called olaparib, shrunk or stabilised tumours in more than half of patients even after other therapies had failed.

In one case a woman with breast cancer is still in remission two years after becoming one of the first to be treated.

The findings come from a trial involving patients with inherited forms of advanced breast, ovarian and prostate cancers caused by mutations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes.

But there are hopes this type of drug might eventually fight more common, non-inherited forms of cancer.

Olaparib targets cancer cells but leaves healthy cells relatively unscathed. It was tested on 60 patients who reported very few side-effects.

Some said it ‘was much easier than chemotherapy’, according to a report in The New England Journal of Medicine.

The trial was carried out by the Institute of Cancer Research and The Royal Marsden Hospital in London, working with the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca.

Dr Johann de Bono, one of the scientists who led the trial, said the positive results meant larger patient trials should begin.

It would take around three to four years of further trials before the drug could become widely available to patients.

By Daily Mail Reporter