The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued a draft guidance to help sponsors identify the optimal dosage for cancer drugs in clinical development and in it, the agency recommends a new approach in selecting such dosages for modern, targeted oncology drugs.   Historically, dose-finding trials for cytotoxic chemotherapy drugs have been designed to determine the maximum tolerated dose (MTD). The MTD paradigm applies to drugs that have a steep dose-response, have...

Cancer drugs under development that show substantial promise over existing therapies and have simple study designs, as well as easy to interpret endpoints, may qualify for a head-start review from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). While the drug will ultimately be reviewed under the same user fee time frame as other products, it may help speed up the review process for sponsors.   On 22 July, FDA published a draft guidance titled, Real-Time Oncology Review (...

The unprecedented number of new investigational agents in clinical development in the competitive oncology space presents a significant challenge for regulatory intelligence professionals. Strategic decisions are complicated by the overwhelming amount of regulatory information scattered across numerous repositories. The development of an in-house database may facilitate success for businesses in the prevailing information-centric world. Effective implementation of an in-ho...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has authorized software designed to help pathologists detect prostate cancer in digitally scanned slides from prostate biopsies. Separately, the agency announced Wednesday that it has made available a list of devices that use artificial intelligence and machine learning.   The newly authorized software, called Paige Prostate, is the first artificial intelligence (AI) tool okayed by FDA for in vitro diagnostic use for prostate...

While groups expressed overwhelming support for the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) draft guidance expanding eligibility criteria for investigational oncology trials, some comments discouraged the agency from taking an approach that dichotomizes the curative and non-curative setting; a pharmaceutical firm suggested that safety data be combined for some investigations performed in curative and non-curative settings.   Among the recommendations of the draft gu...

The safety and effectiveness of robotically assisted surgical devices has yet to be established in the prevention and treatment of breast cancer, according to an updated safety communication released by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).   The agency reiterated that use of these devices has been cleared for procedures such as hysterectomy, prostatectomy, and colectomy based on data from 30-day patient follow-up. However, robotically assisted surgical (RAS) devi...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) "may require” or seek agreement from sponsors to conduct post-marketing studies to analyze long term effects of breast cancer drugs in both pre- and post-menopausal women in a final guidance issued on 17 June. The guidance also provides other considerations for sponsors as they plan for the inclusion of premenopausal women in clinical trials of drugs for breast cancer treatment.   According to the agency’s announcement of the f...

A newly finalized guidance on bispecific antibodies from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) notes that although bispecific antibodies can generally be characterized in the same ways as standard monoclonal antibodies and manufacturing processes may be similar, some scientific and regulatory considerations are unique to bispecifics.   According to a 24 May agency announcement , while the regulatory pathway for evaluating monoclonal antibodies is “well established...

Final guidance from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) specifies when sponsors must conduct pediatric studies for new cancer drugs as well as when those requirements can be waived or deferred.   Sponsors are required to evaluate these oncology drugs in pediatric populations for applications submitted on or after 18 August 2020, under changes made by the FDA Reauthorization Act of 2017 (FDARA).   The guidance addresses molecularly targeted oncology drugs for ...

Premenopausal women should be considered for inclusion in breast cancer clinical trials, according to new draft guidance from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). “Menopausal status should not be the basis of exclusion from any breast cancer clinical trial,” says the draft guidance, which was made available for a 60-day consultation period on 7 October.   The draft guidance puts forward recommendations to help move clinical breast cancer research away from the hi...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Tuesday finalized guidance making recommendations to sponsors encouraging them to enroll male patients in breast cancer clinical trials.   The final guidance comes one year after the agency issued the draft version for comment and includes only minor changes from the previous iteration. (RELATED: FDA calls for men to be enrolled in breast cancer trials , 26 August 2019) .   As in the draft version, FDA explains that ...

Following a series of recalls for the heartburn drug Zantac and other ranitidine drugs due to a genotoxic impurity, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said Friday that the levels of the impurity in ranitidine drugs for heartburn and also in the chemically similar ulcer drug nizatidine “are similar to the levels you would expect to be exposed to if you ate common foods like grilled or smoked meats.” The agency also published a table of the ranitidine and nizatidin...