The drug is ribociclib, manufactured by the Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis. It is available and sold under the brand names Kisqali and Kryxana, according to the US health news site Medical Xpress .
Ribociclib shown to reduce risk of breast cancer recurrence by up to 25%
Ribociclib belongs to a new class of drugs called molecularly targeted therapies. These therapies work by interfering with molecules needed for cancer cells to grow, helping to control tumors.
Ribociclib works by disrupting the CDK4 and CDK6 proteins in breast cancer cells. These proteins are responsible for helping cancer cells divide.
The clinical study of ribociclib was announced at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) on June 2. In the study, scientists tested the drug on 5,100 people with HR-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer in stages II and III. These are the most common types of breast cancer, accounting for about 70% of breast cancer cases.
For breast cancer patients, even if they have won the first battle, there is still a risk of recurrence.
Half of the patients were treated with ribociclib in combination with endocrine therapy, while the other half were treated with endocrine therapy alone. Endocrine therapy is a cancer treatment that blocks the body from making hormones or interferes with the way hormones work. The goal is to stop the growth of cancerous tumors. The entire trial is expected to last about three years.
However, the trial was soon stopped because scientists discovered a clear difference in treatment effectiveness between the two groups. The group that took ribociclib had a significantly reduced risk of breast cancer recurrence. Therefore, it would be unethical to continue the study and deny the group that only took endocrine therapy access to ribociclib.
The study results showed that the risk of breast cancer recurrence in the group taking ribociclib was about 25% lower than in the group taking only endocrine therapy without ribociclib.
"Ribociclib also showed more favorable outcomes in terms of treatment-related survival, relapse-free and relapse-free rates in advanced disease," the study authors said in a statement.
Ribociclib has been approved by regulatory agencies in many countries around the world. Some previous studies have shown the drug's benefits for metastatic breast cancer, according to Medical Xpress.
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