Roche's blockbuster anti-cancer drug Avastin has been approved by the European Union as part of front-line therapy against ovarian cancer, according to a company press release.
The new front-line therapy will follow surgery. It will consist of Avastin used in combination with standard chemotherapy--namely, with carboplatin and paclitaxel. Approval came on the heels of a pair of phase III studies (GOG0218 & ICON7) which showed that newly diagnosed patients with ovarian cancer had longer progression free survival when given Avastin plus chemotherapy and were continued on Avastin compared to patients given chemotherapy only.
Avastin was first approved in 2004 against colorectal cancer. It has since been approved for a handful of other indications in advanced cancers, although it did lose its breast cancer indication in the US in 2011.
Avastin is the first anti-angiogenic treatment to hit the market, meaning the first treatment that works by cutting off a tumor's ability to build a vascular network. It does this by inhibiting the protein vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF).
Source: Roche
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