Scottish Medicines Consortium approves Sanofi’s prostate cancer drug
pharmafile | December 12, 2016 | News story | Manufacturing and Production, Sales and Marketing | Jevtana, Sanofi, prostate cancer
Sanofi’s speciality care global business unit Sanofi Genzyme has announced that the Scottish Medicines Consortium has accepted the company’s Jevtana (cabazitaxel) for routine NHS use for the treatment of metastatic hormone-refractory prostate cancer (mHRPC).
A taxane chemotherapy solution, Jevtana can be used when cancer cells prove resistant to docetaxel and kills cancer by inhibiting cell division. The approval decision was based on data which showed that patients treated with the drug experienced extended survival when compared to an active rival treatment.
According to Sanofi, Jevtana is the only chemotherapy option licensed by the UK Health Technologies Assessment agencies (HTA) to treat advanced prostate cancer which has not responded to hormonal therapies after treatment with docetaxel. With the decision, it is now in routine NHS use across all regions of the UK following recommendation from NICE earlier this year.
In Scotland, prostate cancer is present in as many as one in eleven men.
“We were dedicated to working with the SMC to ensure that the outcome of this review resulted in a positive outcome for patients,” said Dr Jasmin Hussein, Oncology & Immunology franchise director, UK & Ireland at Sanofi Genzyme. ”Through ongoing collaboration our treatment can now be accessed by all doctors who treat patients with metastatic hormone-refractory prostate cancer in the country. The approval of Jevtana by the SMC is important, as it represents a new treatment choice where limited options have existed.”
Roger Wotton, chairman at prostate cancer patients’ charity TACKLE also said of the approval: “This is positive news for men in Scotland who now have the same access as other men in the UK to treatment that increases their chance to live longer. Any extension of time a man with prostate cancer is able to get back to be with family and friends is highly important. The availability of Jevtana means men in Scotland now have an alternative effective treatment option. Likewise, physicians now have another medicine in their arsenal to treat patients.”
Matt Fellows
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