From Yesterday, Genentech Data Showed That People With Metastatic Colorectal Cancer Lived Longer When They Continued on Avastin Plus Chemotherapy

Genentech, a member of the Roche Group

, today announced results from ML18147, a Phase III study in metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) that evaluated Avastin® (bevacizumab) continued with second-line chemotherapy in people who received initial Avastin plus first-line chemotherapy. The study met its primary endpoint of a significant increase in overall survival (OS). In the study, the relative risk of death was reduced by 19 percent for people who continued with Avastin plus second-line chemotherapy compared to those who received chemotherapy alone (HR=0.81, p=0.0062). People who continued with Avastin plus second-line chemotherapy also experienced a significant improvement in progression-free survival (PFS, the time a person lives without the disease getting worse); the risk of their cancer progressing was reduced by 32 percent (HR=0.68, p<0.0001). Adverse events (AEs) in ML18147 were consistent with those seen in previous pivotal trials of Avastin across tumor types. “Our study design was based on previous research showing that sustained VEGF inhibition achieved and maintained anti-tumor activity,” said Hal Barron M.D., chief medical officer and head, Global Product Development. “While conventional practice is to change treatment completely at disease progression, the continued use of Avastin with a new chemotherapy regimen in this study resulted in patients living longer, compared to a new chemotherapy regimen alone.” These results were featured in a press briefing on Saturday, June 2, at the 48th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. Full results will be presented in the ASCO Gastrointestinal (Colorectal) Cancer Oral Abstracts session by Professor Dirk Arnold, the ML18147 principal investigator and associate professor of medicine at the Department of Hematology and Oncology, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Halle, Germany (Abstract CRA3503, Sunday, June 3, 10:45 a.m. CDT).