Roche extends scope of cancer arsenal MabThera

Gireesh Chandra Prasad G I - Mumbai

Swiss drug major F Hoffmann La Roche is bolstering its cancer drug basket finding new uses for its established ’smart bomb’ drug MabThera, opening new revenue streams.

Roche Scientific India officials told Express Pharma Pulse in response to a questionnaire the blockbuster cancer therapy, approved in India for Non- Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (NHL), has in a recent international study, shown efficacy in relapsed indolent NHL and previously untreated follicular (relapsed) NHL. Indolent NHL, representing 45 per cent of NHL patients, is a slow developing but serious cancer of the lymphatic system.

The company was last week quoted as saying in overseas reports the drug has also shown efficacy in treating rheumatoid arthritis along with a new experimental compound called MRA.

Roche earlier told EPP the company was planning to conduct clinical trials of MabThera in India to assess superior survival benefits. It, however, declined to comment when asked about the number of patients to be recruited, the cost and dosage for treating relapsed indolent NHL, saying it was sensitive information. Currently, the post marketing surveillance of the drug approved in India two years ago for NHL, is progressing, it said.

There were 20,437 NHL patients in India in 2000, three fourth of which succumbed to it in that year, the company said quoting an agency monitoring 26 major cancers in the world.

The study showed that MabThera plus chemotherapy was significantly more effective than chemotherapy alone as initial treatment and patients subsequently treated with MabThera maintenance therapy for two years had significantly better progression-free survival than those received no further treatment.

Roche said three international studies on the drug were discontinued much earlier than the original time frame as it met the end points earlier.