Chemotherapy combo with capecitabine extends pancreatic cancer survival rates

One of the largest Phase III trials ever conducted in pancreatic cancer has shown that adding the oral drug capecitabine chemotherapy to gemcitabine prolongs survival without increased toxicity.

The research by Cancer Research UK has been hailed as a major breakthrough by Smitha Krishnamurthi, an American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) expert in pancreatic cancer.

She said: “Pancreatic cancer remains one of the most hard-to-¬treat cancers. It is a major win to find that adding a generic chemotherapy not only improves survival for these patients, but does so with little effect on patients’ quality of life.”