Jefferson researchers show angiostatin is safe when given with radiation for advan...( ther than that you would expect with ra...),Health

ther than that you would expect with radiation alone. It's an important study that will lead to future trials of combination therapy with Angiostatin." In the study, patients received recombinant Angiostatin - an angiogenesis inhibitor drug candidate being developed by EntreMed, Inc., a Rockville, Md.-based biotechnology company - intravenously five times weekly 30 minutes prior to radiotherapy during a five-to-seven week period. The type and location of the patient's tumor determined radiation doses. Some patients had chemotherapy prior to the study. According to Dr. Dicker, in another clinical trial, Angiostatin is currently being administered subcutaneously - under the skin - similar to the way diabetics give themselves insulin shots.

The Angiostatin-radiation trial was one of two Phase I trials involving Angiostatin conducted simultaneously at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital and Jefferson's Kimmel Cancer Center - the first trials of Angiostatin in the United States. The other trial found that giving Angiostatin alone to patients with advanced cancer who had failed prior chemotherapy was safe and had few side effects. Phase I trials test for safety and to determine how the body handles the drug - not necessarily to measure effectiveness. Angiostatin is a protein and a natural tumor inhibitor discovered several years ago in mice in the laboratory of Harvard scientist and surgeon M. Judah Folkman, M.D., and now being developed by EntreMed. It works by blocking the formation of blood vessels, based on the theory that cancers cannot grow or spread without a blood supply - a process known as angiogenesis. Some researchers believe that Angiostatin and other angiogenesis inhibitors will expand the armamentarium of drugs that will halt cancer growth, enabling patients to live with their disease as cancer becomes a chronic illness.

'"/>

Contact: Steve Benowitz
steven.benowitz@mail.tju.edu
215-955-5291
Thomas Jefferson University
20-May-2002

Page: 1 2
Related medicine news :

1. Jefferson Lab medical imager spots breast cancer
2. Jefferson scientists uncover potential trigger of diabetic kidney disease
3. Uric acid may help reduce effects of spinal cord injury, Jefferson researchers find
4. Jefferson scientists help explain statins effects in Alzheimers disease
5. Jefferson scientists find zinc may help prevent esophageal, oral cancers
6. Jefferson virologists coax HIV out of hiding
7. Jefferson scientists find way to see breast cancer activity from outside the body
8. Jefferson and Molecular Targeting Technologies, Inc. scientists create vaccine for wildlife rabies
9. Jefferson scientists use gene therapy to rescue failing hearts in animals
10. Jefferson scientists reveal how some types of rabies invade the brain
11. Jefferson neuroscientists studying new type of Alzheimers drug to halt disease progression