AstraZeneca announced on Wednesday, July 22 that its much-anticipated drug for the treatment of a rare type of eye cancer called uveal melanoma failed in the late-stage of clinical trial it underwent. The experimental drug called selumetinib, in combination with dacarbazine for the treatment of patients with metastatic uveal melanoma, was not able to exhibit the target standard set for the Phase III SUMIT trial.
The particular setback mentioned by the company is the development of an adverse effect feature that is uniform to the present information available for dacarbazine and selumetinib. Nonetheless, a complete evaluation of the yielded data is currently in process.
Selumetinib showed promising data during its Phase II trial hence, a major blow in the Phase III is something that came as a surprise, says Alistair Campbell, a Berenberg analyst. "However, selumetinib is not one of the big three oncology drugs (AZD9291, Lynparza and MEDI4736) that will lead the turnaround of Astra's fortunes in oncology," he wrote in a note. A 0.7 percent decline in the shares of AstraZeneca was noted in the early trading.
Selumetinib is classified under Mitogen-activated Extracellular signal-regulated Kinase (MEK) inhibitors, which are the same as Mekinist, an approved drug from Novartis and cobimetinib, an experimental compound from Exelixis and Roche. According to AstraZeneca, the results of the current clinical trial will not affect the outcomes of other current studies using selumetinib and the company is actually looking forward to presenting these data.
Selumetinib is now being considered as a treatment for advanced non-small cell lung cancer. The drug is also being investigated as treatment for other malignant diseases such as thyroid cancer and neurofibromatosis, which is the growth of cancer cells in the nerves.
"Selumetinib is supported by a strong development programme with different scientific rationale in multiple tumour types as both monotherapy and in alternative combinations," says Antoine Yver, Head of Oncology, Global Medicines Development at AstraZeneca. Oncology is the major medical field of priority for the company as they are expected to introduce about six new cancer drugs by the year 2020.
Uveal melanoma involves the development of malignant cells in the tissues of the eye. The disease is considered rare; however, it still ranks as the most common primary cancer of the eye in adults and makes up approximately 5 percent of all types of melanomas.
Photo: George Redgrave | Flickr
