Schering-Plough reports top rating for Noxafil

Schering-Plough has announced that Noxafil (posaconazole) has been rated with a category 1 recommendation in the most recent National Comprehensive Cancer Network clinical practice guidelines for the prevention and treatment of infection in cancer patients for the prevention of particular invasive fungal infections.

This recommendation relates to the antifungal agent’s indication of preventing infection in patients with acute myelogenous leukaemia or neutropenic patients with myelodysplastic syndromes, in addition to graft-versus-host disease in haematopoietic stem cell transplant patients.

Furthermore, the compound received a category 2b rating for the prevention infections in neutropenic cancer patients undergoing allogeneic haematopoietic stem-cell transplantation.

Amelia Langston, medical director at the Emory Bone Marrow and Stem Cell Transplant Centre at the Emory University Hospital, commented that the inclusion of Noxafil in these guidelines showed the importance of the use of antifungal agents to manage invasive fungal infections in patients at high risk, including those undergoing chemotherapy for cancers or stem cell transplantation,

“These infections are being seen more frequently and are a leading cause of death in these seriously ill patients,” she said.

Earlier this year, Schering-Plough announced the publication of two clinical studies in the New England Journal of Medicine exhibiting the efficacy of Noxafil in preventing infections caused by Candida and Aspergillus in high risk patients.