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Biotech / Medical : Ligand (LGND) Breakout! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Andrew H who wrote (11441)	11/19/1997 12:53:00 AM
From: John McCarthy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 32384

Andrew If this is true, then ALL my impressions are wrong. Regards, John

To: Andrew H who wrote (11441)	11/19/1997 1:35:00 AM
From: Henry Niman	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 32384

Andy, Speaking of LGND's pipeline, here's more on anti-estrogens: Chemo Increases Breast Cancer Survival By Theresa Tamkins NEW YORK (Reuters) -- A combination of chemotherapy and the anti-Estrogen drug Tamoxifen is better than Tamoxifen alone for treating breast cancer patients -- even if the cancer has not spread to lymph nodes in the armpit, a new study suggests. This seems to be true regardless of the tumor size, whether or not the cancer is hormone sensitive, or a patient's age -- though women under 49 seemed to benefit the most, according to a report in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. The addition of chemotherapy adds about 5% to the chances of surviving five years after diagnosis. The findings "fill a major gap in information" about the usefulness of chemotherapy drugs in women whose cancer has not yet spread to the lymph nodes of the armpit, according to lead author Dr. Bernard Fisher, scientific director of the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project (NSABP). Chemotherapy has already been shown to be useful in women who are lymph node positive, meaning that the cancer has spread outside the original tumor site. The study suggests that lymph node analysis may not be as necessary to treatment as once thought, wrote Dr. Trevor Powles in an editorial accompanying the study. The findings are a "watershed" in the use of chemotherapy as a treatment for early breast cancer, said Powles, of the Breast Unit at the Royal Marsden NHS Trust in Surrey, U.K. In the new study, the women treated with the anti-Estrogen drug Tamoxifen, as well as the chemotherapy drugs Methotrexate and Fluorouracil -- known as the MFT group -- had a five-year survival rate of 90%. About 89% of women survived if they also were given a fourth drug, Cyclophosphamide (the CMFT group). In comparison, only 85% of those women treated with Tamoxifen alone were alive five years later. Those treated with chemotherapy were also less likely to have cancer spread elsewhere in the body than those with Tamoxifen alone. All of the 2,306 patients had Estrogen-sensitive breast cancer that had not yet spread to lymph nodes and all had either mastectomy or lumpectomy plus radiation to remove the tumor prior to chemotherapy. Women with Estrogen-sensitive breast cancers usually have a better prognosis because blocking Estrogen in the body can help limit the tumor's growth. It's still not clear if patients with the smallest of tumors -- less than 1 centimeter -- would benefit from both chemotherapy and Tamoxifen, according to Fisher, who is at Allegheny University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. However, this and past studies suggest that most breast cancer patients would benefit from the addition of chemotherapy, regardless of age, lymph node status or the tumor's sensitivity to Estrogen, the authors concluded. SOURCE: Journal of the National Cancer Institute (1997;89:1673-1682)