Today we had our site initiation and start-up meeting for our new prostate cancer trial at the Wenatchee Valley Medical Center. Dr. Christopher Haqq and his colleagues from Cougar Biotechnology, Inc. came up from Los Angeles to kick off this new trial at our clinic. The trial is incorporating one of the newest and most exciting therapies for prostate cancer in the preoperative setting. The drug is called Abiraterone Acetate. It blocks testosterone synthesis thus not allowing testosterone to fuel prostate cancer growth. Prostate cancer cells initially are very dependent on testosterone for their survival. Prostate cancer cells go through cell death when testosterone production is blocked by this potent drug.
The design of the trial is for men who have just been diagnosed with prostate cancer and are planning to have their localized prostate cancer treated with surgery. The study will give all the men 24 weeks of treatment before the surgery. Half will receive the study drug Abiraterone for 12 of the 24 weeks, the other half of the men will receive it for the whole 24 weeks. All men will receive an established and effective therapy for prostate cancer called Lupron for the whole 24 weeks. Therefore, no men will be without therapy prior to their surgery.
The study will be limited to the men with the highest risk of their prostate cancer coming back after surgery. The main goal of the study is to demonstrate significant prostate cancer therapy with the medication prior and a significant reduction of the testosterone levels in the prostate gland prior to surgery. This will hopefully lead to a reduction in the number of men in which the cancer returns after the surgery. The surgery can be performed with the standard surgical approach or with the new Robotic Surgery system just now being employed by our urologist at the Wenatchee Valley Medical Center.
We are excited about the collaboration on this new treatment effort between the Urology department and Genitourinary Medical Oncology department from the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance and our organization.
We feel we are in good company. This study is currently offered at only five institutions in the country. Those five institutions are Dana Farber Cancer Center (Boston), Roswell Park Cancer Center (New York), MD Anderson Cancer Center (Houston), the University of Washington (Seattle) and the Wenatchee Valley Medical Center (Wenatchee, WA).
We are so glad to be able to participate in the evaluation of a new therapy that could be a big breakthrough for the treatment of men in North Central Washington with prostate cancer.
Best Regards Always,
Mitch
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