Velcade ups lymphoma survival

CHICAGO, June 4 (UPI) -- Adding bortezomib -- Velcade -- to standard treatment achieved a one-year, 100 percent overall survival rate in lymphoma, say U.S. doctors.

The new drug, recently approved for treatment of mantle cell lymphoma, appeared to increase survival in patients with more common non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, researchers reported at the 43rd annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology in Chicago.

"B-cell lymphoma is the most prevalent form of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, which affects approximately 1 million patients worldwide. Although current therapies are effective for some, a number of patients still do not achieve adequate response," said Nicolas Mounier, an oncologist at Hopital Saint Louis in Paris.

"This study shows that the addition of Velcade improved the complete response rate and overall survival compared to historical data. These data warrant moving forward in a randomized trial to show more definitively the additive benefit of Velcade."

The phase 2 study evaluated rituximab plus cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine and prednisone (R-CHOP) plus Velcade in newly diagnosed BCL patients.

Mounier said that the overall survival rate among the 48 patients enrolled in the study was 100 percent after a median follow-up of 12 months. Complete response and apparent complete response rate was 83 percent, a superior result compared with the historical response for R-CHOP given for six cycles without Velcade, which ranged from 55 percent to 75 percent.

Velcade is being co-developed by Millennium Pharmaceuticals and Johnson & Johnson.