Late
stage ovarian cancer has been hard to get rid of. It has been a nightmare for
women who discover that they have cancerous cysts in their ovaries. This is why
the news that GlaxoSmithkline was withdrawing its
application to expand the approval of Votrient is disappointing.
Votrient
is the ‘miracle’ drug that has been used in the treatment of sarcomas and
kidney cancer in various countries. It does this by restricting supply to
tumors and hence limiting their growth or spread.
This
is however not just a disappointment to women with cancerous cysts in their
ovaries. As a drug, Votrient has proven to be really profitable for GSK. The
drug was solely responsible for bringing in over $520 million in last year
sales alone.
The
reason for the cancellation of the bid to have it made available for patients
with ovarian cancer has been sighted as being the results from a Phase III trial.
According to the company’s head of Oncology Research and Development, Rafael
Amado, the results showed that the benefits of the drug did not outweigh its
negative effects.
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| Rafael Amado |
Maintaining
a positive outlook, he added:
“While
we are disappointed by the results, we will progress with additional analyses which
may add to the body of scientific evidence in this disease setting.”
More on cysts on ovaries here
