When my father was just 21 years old, his father lost his battle with lung cancer, so my sisters and I were never able to meet him. I think about him almost everyday and wonder what he was like and it sometimes even bothers me that I will never know what kind of person he was, and no one should have to experience that. So when I found this article about a new drug in the United Kingdom that is supposed to be more effective than chemo for certain patients with lung cancer, of course I had to share.
This drug is called crizotinib and, although it won’t work on all lung cancer patients, it does have the ability to help those who suffer from advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), whose cancers contain an overactive version of a protein called anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK). This drug does not necessarily increase overall survival but it can lengthen the amount of time between recovery and possible future relapse. In addition to this, crizotinib was found to reduce the symptoms of lung cancer and better the quality of life.
The way they found out about this drug’s effectiveness was to carry out an experiment in which 343 people affected by NSCLC with overactive ALK were split into two groups. One group was given crizotinib and the other group was given the standard chemotherapy drug, pemetrexed, and either carboplatin and cisplatin. The results were pleasantly surprising, meaning the patients given crizotinib were, on average, cancer-free for 11 months before relapse, while the patients given regular chemotherapy were, on average, cancer-free for only seven months before relapse.
The next goal is to make it more accessible across the UK but because of its high cost, it’s currently too expensive for many people, but medical professionals are hoping that manufacturers and the NHS will come to an agreement, making the drug more available across the UK.
This is really interesting and it reminded me of the lecture we had in class about cancer treatments being ethical. In a lot of cancer trials, the probability evens out on how much better you do with or without experimental treatment. I’m not sure how they do it in the UK but I know in the US there is some debate about letting people who are terminally ill have treatments that are not government approved. Many argue that because they are dying anyway they should be able to do whatever they want to their body if there is a chance it will save them, so there is another ethical debate there. I hope more news comes out about this medicine though!
Some of my favorite things to read in the news is about progresses in cancer treatment. Reading this article makes me curious on if this could really be it, could this medicine be a step towards the cure? I find it amazing how people make medicine, as well and how do they even know were to begin? Also, could patients take the medicine multiple times if they were to have a relapse?
Great work, too!