PharmaCyte Biotech Inc (PMCB)

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The future of chemotherapy

The study showed that combining chemotherapy with Merck’s checkpoint inhibitor significantly increased survival rates in patients with the most common type of the illness, known as non-squamous, non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). 

Patients who received Keytruda, the checkpoint inhibitor, in addition to chemotherapy were 51 per cent less likely to die during the trial than those taking chemo on its own, according to the study of 616 participants. 

“These clinical data now suggest this combination as a new standard of care for the first-line treatment of these patients,” said Dr Leena Gandhi, an oncologist at the NYU Langone Medical Center, who led the study. 

Dr Roger Perlmutter, Merck’s chief scientist, said the “unambiguous” results had exceeded the company’s expectations. “As a first-line treatment this is better than anything we know about.”

However, the combination still burdened patients with the debilitating and sometimes life-threatening side effects associated with chemotherapy. 

So who has a technology for tumors that could avoid those debilitating and sometimes life threatening effects?