Newsy Story About Lumiliximab Perhaps Leading to More Complete Remissions in CLL

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Analysis: New drugs attack blood diseases

By ED SUSMAN

ORLANDO, Fla., Dec. 12 (UPI) -- Scientists said Tuesday that new

experimental medications are being rolled out from pharmaceutical

companies to defeat some of the uncommon but deadly and mysterious

diseases -- cancers and other illnesses that arise from cells that

go awry in blood.

" I went into hematology 25 years ago because one of my mentors

explained that we had a better molecular understanding of blood

diseases than we did of other medical disorders, "

Kaushansky, professor and chair of the Department of Medicine at the

University of California-San Diego.

<snip>

-- Researchers said they were encouraged by the Phase 1/2 studies of

lumiliximab, a monoclonal antibody that may be effective as an

additional compound for treating patients with chronic lymphocytic

leukemia.

In a study in which 31 patients were enrolled, the addition of the

new agent being developed by Biogen Idec in San Diego appeared to

help half the patients achieve a complete response, meaning clinical

evidence of their disease disappeared.

Lumiliximab was added to a standard treatment regimen of anti-cancer

drugs fludarabine, cyclophosphamide and rituximab in the early

clinical trial.

" These data suggest that lumiliximab plus these drugs may produce a

higher complete response rate than just the combination -- without

additional toxicity, " said Byrd, director of the hematological

malignancies program at the Arthur Comprehensive Cancer Center

at Ohio State University in Columbus. " Based upon this data, a

multicenter, global, randomized study of the combination with

lumiliximab compared with the drug without lumiliximab is being

initiated. "

<snip>

" Ten years ago we might have had one or two of these targeted agents

in testing, " he said. " Today, we have many, many of these drugs,

plus older ones that are finding new treatment niches. That is what

all the excitement is about in this field. "

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