An Australian-developed cancer drug, Venetoclax, has been fast-tracked for use in the United States. Cancer patients are cautiously optimistic as the drug has all of the promises of a wonder drug.
Professor John Seymour, of the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, helped oversee the trial.
He said the treatment worked in a very different way to traditional therapies.
"Cells, when they are born, are destined to die and cancer cells and particularly leukaemia cells delay that death by using a protein called BCL2 that stops the normal time of death," he explained to 7.30.
Even more promising that the drug seems to be able to bypass the protein of leukemia cells even when they survive chemotherapy. The early trials have been mostly tried on individuals who have already undergone treatments and are showing a re-emergence of cancer after a remission period. The drug can be taken as a pill and has shown an incredible designer-drug-like response to tumors. This is a good thing but also something that doctors must be wary of. Watching someone’s very large tumor “melt away” is exciting but can also lead to the leukemic tumor leaking into the blood stream very quickly and throwing off the patient’s electrolyte balance. A worst-case scenario is the patient’s heart stopping. However, the most recent trials have started with very low doses of the drug, then slowly upping the drug’s potency under very close monitoring of the patient. The results have been incredibly promising.
Below you can watch Dr. Thomas Kipps of UC San Diego talk about research being done with the approved Venetoclax, what is promising and what must be done to research this drug safely.