Emerging targeted therapies offer advantages over currently-used platinum-resistant ovarian cancer drugs

The effect of an emerging therapy on key efficacy endpoints, including time to disease progression and overall survival, has the most influence over surveyed US and European oncologists' prescribing decisions for platinum-resistant advanced ovarian cancer, according to a new report from health care advisory firm Decision Resources.

The emerging agents for this indication - Roche/Genentech/Chugai's Avastin (bevacizumab; which is already approved in Europe for recurrent platinum-sensitive ovarian cancer), Amgen/Takeda Pharmaceutical's trebananib, Merck & Co/Endocyte's vintafolide and AstraZeneca's olaparib - are all expected to offer efficacy advantages over currently available therapies used to treat platinum-resistant advanced ovarian cancer.

The Decision Base 2013 report - titled Ovarian Cancer (Platinum-Resistant Advanced): Are Emerging Targeted Therapies Poised to Fill the Significant Unmet Need for This Difficult-to-Treat Patient Population? - finds that surveyed US oncologists would prescribe Avastin in combination with either weekly paclitaxel (Bristol-Myers Squibb's Taxol, generics) or Janssen Biotech's Doxil/Caelyx to a total of 55% of their drug-treated patients with platinum-resistant advanced ovarian cancer.