Scientists treating patients with inherited forms of advanced breast, ovarian and prostate cancers say that a new drug olaparib has successfully completed a Phase I clinical trial with promising results.

Inherited breast, ovarian and prostate cancers can occur as a result of a mutation in the BRAC1 and BRAC2 genes, leaving healthy cells unable to repair DNA damage and sometimes resulting in the development of cancerous cells.

Olaparip is a PARP (Poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase) inhibitor and works by inhibiting DNA repair in cancer cells, causing the cell to die.

The drug works with an individual patient’s own genetic deficiency and targets unhealthy cells, while leaving healthy cells virtually untouched.

Patients trialling olaparib experienced very few side effects, said the joint team at The Royal Marsden Hospital, the Institute of Cancer Research and the Netherlands Cancer Institute. Some patients said the treatment was “much easier” than chemotherapy.

The Phase I trial – sponsored by AstraZeneca/KuDOS – also found that in more than half of the patients who received olaparib, tumours shrank or stabilised. Many of the patients had previously received standard therapies and researchers reported that one of the first patients to receive olaparib was still in remission after two years.

Joint lead researcher Professor Stan Kaye – who is supported by Cancer Research UK – said:

“This is a very important drug for the treatment of BRCA1/2-related cancer. The next step is to test this drug on other more common types of ovarian and breast cancers, where we hope it will be just as effective.”

The research is published in The New England Journal of Medicine.

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