Maturing data on targeted therapies, vaccines for advanced prostate cancer hold promise

Key Points

The program on advanced prostate cancer at the 2012 AUA annual meeting will include maturing data from clinical trials investigating targeted and vaccine therapies, as well as some preliminary information suggesting that folate may have a chemopreventive effect.

"Urologists have long been waiting for treatment modalities that can improve outcomes for men with advanced prostate cancer after they develop hormonally insensitive disease. We have recently gotten some newer chemotherapy agents to use, but accumulating data from investigations of targeted therapies and therapeutic vaccines provide hope that we will have other, more effective options available in the future," said Dr. Thrasher, professor and chair of urology, University of Kansas Medical Center, Kansas City.

Reports on targeted therapy for men with castrate-resistant metastatic prostate cancer will include findings from a phase III study of radium-223 chloride (Alpharadin) and a pooled analysis of long-term follow-up data from four phase I and II studies on radiolabeled-J591. Radium-223 chloride is an investigational alpha-emitting radionuclide that targets bone metastases with high-energy alpha particles of short range. J591 is a radioimmunotherapy agent using a monoclonal antibody that selectively binds to the external domain of prostate-specific membrane antigen.

The results from the AUA reports indicate these modalities are effective in killing their cancer cell targets. Treatment with J591 resulted in impressive PSA declines, and both agents appeared to have benefits for improving median overall survival, noted Dr. Thrasher.