Meditech starts anti-cancer clinical trial

Meditech Research is to start clinical trials on its HyCAMP anti-cancer compound, targeting colorectal tumours in patients at the Centre for the Development of Cancer Therapeutics in Melbourne.

Meditech specialises in the development of naturally occurring carbohydrate compounds (such as hyaluronan) to improve the delivery and effectiveness of chemotherapy to tumours whilst at the same time reducing conventional treatment side-effects.

"Many patients that are prescribed [anti-cancer drugs] to treat advanced colorectal cancer fail to complete the full course of chemotherapy because they are unable to tolerate the severe side effects associated with [the treatment]," said Meditech director Prof Richard Fox. "If our pre-clinical data demonstrating a reduction in gastro-intestinal side-effects and tumour destruction is replicated in the clinical trial, HyCAMP could be expected to deliver significant clinical benefits to patients," he added.

"We are initially working on a pharmacokinetic study, initially in Phase II, then we shall go on to do an efficacy trial too," noted Assoc Prof Tracey Brown, Meditech's R&D director.

Brown said the initial trial would be conducted using 30 patients, and then if results proved satisfactory, a further 25-30 patients would be enrolled. "We anticipate producing a fully reported result in December 2004," said Brown, who added that the company had four more potential trial products waiting in the wings. "We would love to run more before then but we are concentrating on our most potentially lucrative products right now," she said.

The Centre for Developmental Cancer Therapeutics (CDCT) is a cooperative venture of six Melbourne institutions with international reputations for cancer research and treatment. CDCT affiliates are the Austin and Repatriation Medical Centre, Peter MacCallum Cancer Institute, The Royal Melbourne Hospital, Western Hospital, Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research and The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research.