Boehringer Ingelheim receives new EU approval for Giotrif

Boehringer Ingelheim's cancer drug Giotrif has been approved in Europe for the treatment of patients with advanced squamous cell carcinoma of the lung.

The European Commission has approved the oral therapy for use among patients whose disease has progressed on or after treatment with platinum-based chemotherapy. The condition is the second largest sub-type of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

This approval was based on positive findings from the LUX-Lung 8 study, which showed significantly improved overall survival and progression-free survival rates for Giotrif compared to an established therapy option.

Giotrif is already approved in more than 60 countries for the treatment of patients with EGFR mutation-positive NSCLC.

Dr Mehdi Shahidi, medical head for solid tumour oncology at Boehringer Ingelheim, said: "We are pleased to offer an effective oral treatment option for patients suffering from this type of lung cancer to the European market."

The therapy has been evaluated in a clinical trial programme called LUX-Lung, which represents the largest collection of clinical trials to date of any EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor. More than 3,760 patients were enrolled across the eight studies.