Avastin Approved in First-Line Lung Cancer Treatment

Genentech received approval from the FDA for Avastin to be used in combination with carboplatin and paclitaxel chemotherapy for the first-line treatment of patients with unresectable, locally advanced, recurrent or metastatic non-squamous, non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), the most common type of lung cancer. The approval is based on a Phase III study (E4599) that showed Avastin in combination with chemotherapy resulted in a 25% improvement in overall survival compared to chemotherapy alone.

“Bevacizumab, in combination with chemotherapy, is the first therapy in 10 years to improve on standard first-line treatment for advanced lung cancer and the first FDA-approved therapy ever to extend survival for these patients beyond one year in a large, randomized clinical study,” said Alan Sandler, M.D., director of Medical Thoracic Oncology at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center in Nashville, TN and lead investigator on the E4599 trial. “With this survival benefit, bevacizumab represents an important therapy for many advanced lung cancer patients fighting this difficult disease.”