For Advanced Prostate Cancer, New Drug Slows Disease

Prostate cancer is the second most common form of cancer in men

A new medication proved effective in slowing the spread of metastatic prostate cancer, while helping to maintain the quality of life, in patients with advanced disease. The phase 3 study was unblinded midway, allowing patients receiving the placebo to instead take the drug because of the favorable results.

The study is the first randomized clinical trial to document expanded benefits among a particular group of prostate cancer patients in whom the disease had spread. The medication, abiraterone acetate — marketed as Zytiga — also delayed the development of pain and deterioration of the patients’ overall condition.

The researchers say the medication could provide new treatment options.

“This drug extended lives and gave patients more time when they weren’t experiencing significant pain from the disease,” said the principal investigator of the international trial, Charles J. Ryan, MD, an associate professor of clinical medicine at the UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center.

“This is an interim analysis, the final analysis should be available in 2014,” he said. “But it appears that this medication may lay a foundation for the use of this drug at an earlier stage of prostate cancer, and its benefits may be able to be delivered to a much wider population of patients as a result.”