As Bay­er, No­var­tis stack up their ra­dio­phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal da­ta at #ES­MO21, a key de­bate takes shape

Ten years ago, a small Nor­we­gian biotech by the name of Al­ge­ta showed up at ES­MO — then the Eu­ro­pean Mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary Can­cer Con­fer­ence 2011 — and de­clared that its Bay­er-part­nered tar­get­ed ra­dionu­clide ther­a­py, ra­di­um-223 chlo­ride, boost­ed the over­all sur­vival of cas­tra­tion-re­sis­tant prostate can­cer pa­tients with symp­to­matic bone metas­tases.

In a Phase III study dubbed AL­SYM­P­CA, pa­tients who were treat­ed with ra­di­um-223 chlo­ride lived a me­di­an of 14 months com­pared to 11.2 months. The FDA would stamp an ap­proval on it based on those da­ta two years lat­er, af­ter Bay­er snapped up Al­ge­ta and chris­tened the drug Xofi­go.

Unlock this article instantly by becoming a free subscriber.

You’ll get access to free articles each month, plus you can customize what newsletters get delivered to your inbox each week, including breaking news.

SIGN UP LOG IN BECOME A PREMIUM SUBSCRIBER