Pan-Canadian ODR recommendation supports use of Tagrisso for NSCLC subset

The pan-Canadian Oncology Drug Review (pCODR) has issued a positive clinical recommendation of the reimbursement of Tagrisso (osimertinib), a novel, targeted treatment for a subset of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients.

Tagrisso, from Anglo-Swedish pharma major AstraZeneca (LSE: AZN), is the first and only oral, targeted therapy shown to shrink tumor size and slow disease progression in patients with locally advanced or metastatic epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) T790M mutation-positive NSCLC who have progressed on or after EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) therapy, the company stated.

Tagrisso was recently granted full approval by the US Food and Drug Administration and European Commission, and was first approved by Health Canada in July 2016 under an accelerated framework and has been granted the Notice of Compliance with Conditions (NOC/c), based on promising evidence of clinical efficacy data, pending the results of additional trials to verify its clinical benefit.