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Clinical Trials

Date: 2018-07-04

Type of information: Publication of results in a medical journal

phase: 3

Announcement: publication of results in The New English Journal of Medicine

Company: Exelixis (USA - CA) Ipsen (France)

Product: Cabometyx™ (cabozantinib)

Action mechanism:

  • tyrosine kinase inhibitor.  Cabozantinib is a kinase inhibitor that blocks abnormal kinase proteins involved in the development and growth of medullary cancer cells. Cabozantinib inhibits the activity of tyrosine kinases including MET, AXL and VEGFR-1, -2 and -3. These receptor tyrosine kinases are involved in both normal cellular function and in pathologic processes such as oncogenesis, metastasis, tumor angiogenesis, and maintenance of the tumor microenvironment.
  • In February 2016, Exelixis and Ipsen jointly announced an exclusive licensing agreement for the commercialization and further development of cabozantinib indications outside of the United States, Canada and Japan.

Disease:

Therapeutic area:

Country: Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Poland, Romania, Spain, Sweden,Taiwan, Turkey, UK, USA

Trial details:

  • CELESTIAL is a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study of cabozantinib in patients with advanced HCC conducted at more than 100 sites globally in 19 countries. The trial was designed to enroll 760 patients with advanced HCC who received prior sorafenib and may have received up to two prior systemic cancer therapies for HCC and had adequate liver function. Enrollment of the trial was completed in September 2017. Patients were randomized 2:1 to receive 60 mg of cabozantinib once daily or placebo and were stratified based on etiology of the disease (hepatitis C, hepatitis B or other), geographic region (Asia versus other regions) and presence of extrahepatic spread and/or macrovascular invasion (yes or no). No cross-over was allowed between the study arms during the blinded treatment phase of the trial. The primary endpoint for the trial is OS, and secondary endpoints include objective response rate and PFS. Exploratory endpoints include patient-reported outcomes, biomarkers and safety.
  • In October 2017, Exelixis announced that the independent data monitoring committee for the CELESTIAL study recommended that the trial be stopped for efficacy following review at the second planned interim analysis, with cabozantinib providing a statistically significant and clinically meaningful improvement in OS compared with placebo in patients with previously treated advanced HCC. (NCT01908426)

Latest news:

  • • On July 4, 2018, Exelixis announced that The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) published results from the CELESTIAL phase 3 pivotal trial of cabozantinib in patients with previously treated advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). The data, originally presented at the 2018 American Society of Clinical Oncology’s Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium (ASCO-GI) in January, demonstrate that cabozantinib provided a statistically significant and clinically meaningful improvement in overall survival (OS) versus placebo.
  • Median OS in CELESTIAL was 10.2 months with cabozantinib versus 8.0 months with placebo (HR 0.76, 95 percent CI 0.63-0.92; p=0.0049). Median progression-free survival (PFS) was more than doubled, at 5.2 months with cabozantinib and 1.9 months with placebo (HR 0.44, 95 percent CI 0.36-0.52; p<0.0001). Objective response rates per RECIST 1.1 were 4 percent with cabozantinib and 0.4 percent with placebo (p=0.0086). Disease control (partial response or stable disease) was achieved by 64 percent of patients in the cabozantinib group compared with 33 percent of patients in the placebo group.
  • In a subgroup analysis of patients whose only prior therapy for advanced HCC was sorafenib (70 percent of patients in the study), median OS was 11.3 months with cabozantinib versus 7.2 months with placebo (HR 0.70, 95 percent CI 0.55-0.88). Median PFS in the subgroup was 5.5 months with cabozantinib versus 1.9 months with placebo (HR 0.40, 95 percent CI 0.32-0.50).
  • Adverse events were consistent with the known safety profile of cabozantinib. The most common (?10 percent) grade 3 or 4 adverse events in the cabozantinib group compared to the placebo group were palmar-plantar erythrodysesthesia (17 percent vs. 0 percent), hypertension (16 percent vs. 2 percent), increased aspartate aminotransferase (12 percent vs. 7 percent), fatigue (10 percent vs. 4 percent) and diarrhea (10 percent vs. 2 percent). Treatment-related grade 5 adverse events occurred in six patients in the cabozantinib group (hepatic failure, esophagobronchial fistula, portal vein thrombosis, upper gastrointestinal hemorrhage, pulmonary embolism and hepatorenal syndrome) and in one patient in the placebo group (hepatic failure). Sixteen percent of patients in the cabozantinib arm and three percent of patients in the placebo arm discontinued treatment due to treatment-related adverse events.

Is general: Yes