Adventrx: Supplemental results encouraging for CoFactor in colorectal cancer trial

By E. Janene Geiss

Philadelphia, June 29 - Adventrx Pharmaceuticals, Inc. announced Thursday encouraging results from a follow-up evaluation of the 50 patients who completed the CoFactor plus 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) phase 2 clinical trial.

The new information captures clinical responses to second line therapies for their metastatic colorectal cancer that were selected by the investigators, according to a company news release.

The Adventrx protocol mandated only first-line treatment and long-term follow-up monitoring, but did not guide in any way the selection or use of subsequent therapy.

The results were presented at the 8th World Congress on Gastrointestinal Cancer in Barcelona, Spain.

Fifty patients completed CoFactor plus 5-FU treatment in a phase 2 clinical trial and were followed for second-line therapy.

Four underwent partial liver resection for potential cure and 29 patients received chemotherapy with irinotecan or oxaliplatin, alone or in combination with 5-FU/leucovorin, as well as other agents.

Seventeen patients received no post-study intervention. Of the 29 patients who received post-study chemotherapy, four patients, or 13.8%, had an objective response, including one complete response, officials said.

Median overall survival, measured from the start of first line treatment, was 15.1 months for the whole population and was 23 months for the 33 patients that received second-line treatment, which includes the four patients who underwent surgical resection.

"Most encouraging is the overall survival of 23 months observed in patients completing first- and second-line therapy, which exceeds by two months the median survival reported in patients commencing with either Folfox or Folfiri," James A. Merritt, chief medical adviser for Adventrx, said in the release.

CoFactor is a folate-based biomodulator drug designed to enhance the activity and reduce associated toxicity of the widely used cancer chemotherapeutic agent 5-fluorouracil (5-FU).

Adventrx is a San Diego biopharmaceutical company focused on cancer and infectious disease.

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