Dimethaid announces new pancreatic cancer trial with WF10
Phase II trial to be initiated at University of Heidelberg
Pharmaceutical developer Dimethaid Research Inc. announced that it is commencing a Phase II trial of its immune modulator, WF10, as adjuvant treatment for pancreatic cancer. The study will be conducted at the European pancreas Center of the University of Heidelberg Clinic for surgery, Germany, by coordinating investigator Prof. Dr. Helmut Friess, Assistant Medical Director. Enrolment will include up to 43 patients with advanced, inoperable cancer who will also receive co-therapy with oral capecitabine.
In previous use, Dr. Friess administered WF10 to four patients, to supplement each individual treatment regimen. All four patients demonstrated a clinical response that exceeded the expected survival time and quality of life. Three of the four patients had metastatic disease with a predicted median survival of approximately six months with standard chemotherapy. Following various combinations of chemotherapy and radiotherapy in combination with WF10, they survived 12, 14 and 22 months, respectively. The fourth patient has locally-advanced disease, normally associated with a median survival of 6-10 months, and is still alive after 16 months.
Current concepts in cancer biology suggest that the inflammatory environment in the pancreas enhances signalling pathways of tumour growth factors and other chemokines. Treatment with WF10 has been shown in previous work to modulate the immune response by influencing the monocyte/macrophage system, natural killer cells and cytotoxic T lymphocytes. It is proposed that this activity will exert an adjuvant anti-tumour effect resulting in increased survival and improved quality of life in patients with pancreatic cancer. A further rationale for combining WF10 and capecitabine is a potentially beneficial interaction between the two drugs within the cancer cells (data unpublished).
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