Adgero Biopharmaceuticals touted positive clinical data from studies of its late-stage photodynamic therapy platform for the treatment of cutaneous oncology indications, including unresectable metastatic breast cancer.
The Princeton, N.J.-based company’s REM-001 therapy consists of a laser light source, a light delivery device and a photosensitizer drug.
The therapy has been evaluated in 4 Phase II/III clinical trials in patients with cutaneous metastatic breast cancer, targeting patients who have previously failed radiation therapy. Adgero said it is also analyzing data from a Phase IIa trial of its therapy as a treatment for recurrent basal cell carcinoma in patients with basal cell Nevus syndrome.
REM-001 has been studied in 4 Phase 2/3 clinical trials in cutaneous metastatic breast cancer (“CMBC”) patients, primarily targeting patients who had previously failed radiation therapy. Adgero is also currently evaluating Phase 2a data of REM-001 Therapy for the treatment of recurrent basal cell carcinoma, particularly in patients with basal cell Nevus syndrome (“BCNS”).
The data presented today at the 37th ASLMS Annual Conference was a retrospective analysis that assessed REM-001 in combination with chemotherapy in 149 patients across 4 different studies. The studies consisted of patients with and without hormone therapy and chemotherapy.
The researchers examined whether or not patients saw 50% or greater reduction in lesion size. They concluded that the overall lesion response rate was 88% for the patients that received REM-001 plus chemotherapy/hormone therapy and 81% for patients receiving REM-001 alone.
Adgero said that the overall response rate was largely driven by its REM-001 therapy and was independent of chemotherapy or homone therapy, because the difference in response rates for the 2 groups was within experimental error.
“The results from our analysis indicated that REM-001 provided a high lesion response rate in those patients that were evaluable and, more importantly that the response is believed to be independent of whether or not the patient received chemotherapy. Our conclusion from this data is that REM-001 therapy may be a complementary treatment to chemotherapy for metastatic breast cancer patients that have CMBC and we believe that REM-001 Therapy holds promise as a locoregional CMBC treatment to prevent widespread lesion development,” clinical investigator Dr. Ron Allison said in prepared remarks.
