Astellas reports positive data from prostate cancer drug trial

Astellas Pharma has reported positive data supporting the benefits of its prostate cancer therapy enzalutamide, developed in association with Medivation.

New data from the phase III Affirm trial has demonstrated the efficacy of the drug in delivering improvements in terms of health-related quality of life and the time to a first skeletal-related event.

It meant that the drug was able to meet its secondary endpoint goals in the study, which involved male patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer previously treated with docetaxel-based chemotherapy.

Co-principal investigator Professor Johann de Bono, of the Institute of Cancer Research and the Royal Marsden Hospital in London, said: "The success of this trial could give doctors a new therapy option for men with advanced prostate cancer."

This comes in the same week that Astellas and Aveo Oncology announced encouraging results from a clinical trial of tivozanib, their collaboratively-developed therapy for advanced renal cell carcinoma, when compared to an established alternative.