Cancer Drug

A crucial cancer drug has been in short supply since midsummer - and its maker, Johnson & Johnson Inc., has not been able to remedy the situation since. The medicine, Doxil, is used to treat patients with ovarian cancer, multiple myeloma or Kaposi's sarcoma after first-line treatments have failed. In July, J&J's Janssen division sent a letter to healthcare providers warning of the shortage and advised against prescribing it to new patients. In August, the drug company sent out another letter announcing a patient registry for Doxil so that they could wait in line, so to speak, for supplies of the drug as they became available.

A drug that has been approved for the treatment of a type of skin cancer since 1999 appears to reverse Alzheimer's symptoms -- in mice.  Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine neuroscientist Gary Landreth and colleagues reported Thursday that bexarotene quickly cleared away beta-amyloid plaque, believed to cause the cognitive deficits of Alzheimer's disease, from the brains of genetically engineered mice.  Mice who received bexarotene...

A drug that has been approved for the treatment of a type of skin cancer since 1999 appears to reverse Alzheimer's symptoms -- in mice.  Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine neuroscientist Gary Landreth and colleagues reported Thursday that bexarotene quickly cleared away beta-amyloid plaque, believed to cause the cognitive deficits of Alzheimer's disease, from the brains of genetically engineered mice.  Mice who received bexarotene...

Biotech giant Amgen is hoping to bolster its cancer drug pipeline by buying fellow drug developer Micromet Inc. for $1.16 billion. At $11 a share, with an Amgen subsidiary buying the majority of Micromet's stock and then the Amgen parent company picking up the rest, the price represents a 33% premium on Micromet's closing price Wednesday. Thousand Oaks-based Amgen is itself among the world's premier drug makers but hasn't had many popular drugs in years. Rockville, Md.-based Micromet, meanwhile, is testing a promising treatment for leukemia and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

An experimental anticancer drug that targets a specific genetic mutation benefits 80% of patients with metastatic melanoma, although in some cases the benefit was short-lived, researchers said Wednesday. The results came in a relatively small Phase II clinical trial, and testing will now proceed to a larger Phase III trial to gain approval for marketing the drug, called PLX4032. Researchers hope the drug might also provide benefits for some other types of tumors that share the same genetic defect.

What will all the loggers do when the forests are gone? MARJORIE POWELL, Cypress

Terminally ill cancer patients are turning to black-market distributors for an unapproved cancer drug in efforts to extend their lives, according to a report Thursday in the journal Nature. The compound, which is known as dichloroacetate, or DCA, has caused cancers to shrink in rats without producing side effects. But DCA, which has been around for years, has a chemical structure that cannot be patented, and no pharmaceutical company has shown interest in it as an anti-cancer medication.

Amgen Inc. will pay Kyowa Hakko Kogyo Co. $100 million initially and as much as $420 million tied to the development of an experimental medicine for inflammation and cancer, the companies said. Kyowa Hakko is the Tokyo-based drug unit of Kirin Holdings Co. The deal gives Thousand Oaks-based Amgen a potential medication that could join its anti-inflammatory medicine Enbrel. Shares fell $1.01 to $44.24.

Aphton Corp. said Rhone-Poulenc's vaccines unit has agreed to pay it up to $10 million for the right to sell its experimental cancer drug, Gastrimmune. Under the agreement, Woodland Hills-based Aphton will be responsible for the development and clinical studies of the drug, which is being developed to treat patients with stomach, liver and pancreatic cancers. Pasteur Merieux, a unit of France's Rhone-Poulenc, will sell the drug in the United States, Canada, Europe and Mexico.

A medication for people with advanced colorectal cancer who have exhausted all other treatment options appears to slow tumor growth and extend life, according to new data. Bayer HealthCare, the makers of regorafenib, said it would seek Food and Drug Administration approval of the medication this year. If approved, regorafenib would be the first new treatment for colorectal cancer in more than five years. Although chemotherapy and other medications can extend life in people with metastatic cancer (cancer that has spread throughout the body)

Some women stop taking their breast cancer drugs early, and a study reveals why: side effects from the medication may be more than they can bear. The study included 686 postmenopausal women who were taking aromatase inhibitors, which halt estrogen production in postmenopausal women whose cancer cells are fueled by the hormone, thus reducing the risk of the cancer returning. The recommended length of time to stay on the medication is five years. Among the participants, 10% quit after two years and 54% quit between 25 months and 4.1 years.

For patients paralyzed by spinal cord injuries, Geron Corp.'s stem cell research was the shining hope. The biotech firm showered scientists with millions of dollars to develop a treatment to reverse spinal damage. The therapy was the first treatment derived from embryonic stem cells to be cleared by the Food and Drug Administration for testing in humans. But last week, Geron abruptly pulled the plug on its pioneering trial and the rest of its stem cell business, including early work on treatments for heart ailments, diabetes and other diseases.

The Food and Drug Administration has announced that it is revoking approval for the cancer drug Avastin for treatment of breast cancer. Here are some facts about the drug.   What is Avastin?   Avastin (bevacizumab) is a so-called biological therapy and the first drug approved by the FDA that was designed to inhibit growth of blood vessels feeding tumors.   Who makes it? Avastin is made by the biotechnology company Genentech, headquartered in South San Francisco.    How does Avastin work?

The cancer drug Avastin should not be used to treat breast cancer that has spread to other organs because it doesn't help patients enough to justify its risky side effects, the Food and Drug Administration ruled Friday. The decision comes five months after an FDA advisory committee recommended that the federal agency withdraw its approval of Avastin for breast cancer patients. Clinical trial results have fueled doubts for years about its value for treating breast cancer. Still, FDA Commissioner Margaret A. Hamburg said the choice was difficult because so many women and their doctors have put their faith in the drug and lobbied hard on its behalf.

A crucial cancer drug has been in short supply since midsummer - and its maker, Johnson & Johnson Inc., has not been able to remedy the situation since. The medicine, Doxil, is used to treat patients with ovarian cancer, multiple myeloma or Kaposi's sarcoma after first-line treatments have failed. In July, J&J's Janssen division sent a letter to healthcare providers warning of the shortage and advised against prescribing it to new patients. In August, the drug company sent out another letter announcing a patient registry for Doxil so that they could wait in line, so to speak, for supplies of the drug as they became available.

A drug born of a revolutionary approach to cancer treatment causes rapid weight loss and improved metabolic function in monkeys, scientists have found. Coming in the wake of multiple setbacks for proposed diet drugs, the early success of a peptide dubbed "adipotide" by its creators may open a new front in the war against obesity, several researchers said. The study, published Wednesday, describes trials in which three species of primates responded to injections of the synthetic peptide by eating less, shedding belly fat and showing changes in metabolic function likely to keep at bay Type 2 diabetes — a frequent consequence of obesity.

Imagine that you had a type of cancer that could be cured with chemotherapy - but supplies of the drug were limited, and you might not get it. This is the scenario facing an unknown number of patients who normally would depend on drugs like paclitaxel (Taxol), doxorubicin (Doxil), vincristine (Oncovin), methotrexate(Trexall, Rheumatrex), leucovorin and bleomycin (Blenoxane). On Monday, President Obama signed an executive order directing the Food and Drug Administration to take steps to help resolve such shortages.