Novel radiotherapy-drug combinations workshop leads to new paper

In February 2018, Combinations Alliance supported a two day meeting organised by AACR, FDA, and ASTRO to build on the work done by the joint working group in their landmark paper published in 2016 to boost the number of novel drugs being successfully registered in combination with radiotherapy.  Since radiotherapy is one of the principal curative treatment options for patients with cancer, this is a very important initiative to improve treatment further.

Several researchers who participated in the workshop discussed some of the ongoing challenges of novel radiotherapy-drug combinations and share their thoughts in the article published last week in Clinical Cancer Research (http://clincancerres.aacrjournals.org/content/clincanres/early/2018/11/2...).

Doctor Saif Ahmad, clinical lecturer in clinical oncology at University of Cambridge, UK and the first author of the paper sees great potential in drug-radiotherapy combination treatments.

"With attendance from patient representatives, regulators, clinicians, academics and industry partners, the Workshop’s diverse interactions identified a number of barriers to drug-radiotherapy combinations entering the clinic. Many of these barriers could be overcome through greater stakeholder collaboration at early stages of drug development, having a transformative impact on the status quo. Our article explores these various challenges and sets out actionable recommendations to increase the success of novel drug-radiotherapy combinations.”

To learn more about the FDA-AACR-ASTRO Clinical Development of Drug-Radiotherapy Combinations workshop, meeting materials including select webcast recordings, presentation slides, and full transcripts are available on the AACR website.