Nab-paclitaxel plus cc-486 as treatment for non-small cell lung cancer

This study wanted to find which combination of medications worked best for advanced non-small cell lung cancer, nab-paclitaxel (Abraxane) alone, or nab-paclitaxel plus CC-486. The study found that there was no benefit seen when CC-486 was added to treatment with nab-paclitaxel.  

There are a number of options for treatment of non-small cell lung cancer. Surgery is very common, as is chemotherapy. Nab-paclitaxel is a new chemotherapy drug. CC-486 is also a new drug. It is not known if adding CC-486 to nab-paclitaxel will be more effective than just using nab-paclitaxel by itself.

This study consisted of 161 patients. All of the patients had advanced non-small cell lung cancer. Of these, 81 patients were treated with both nab-paclitaxel and CC-486. The remaining 80 patients were only treated with nab-paclitaxel. Treatment time varied between the patients depending on how the disease progressed.

Overall, patients who received nab-paclitaxel went for 4.2 months without the cancer growing. The patients who received nab-paclitaxel and CC-486 went for 3.2 momths without the cancer growing. The average survival was 17 months in the patients who only received nab-paclitaxel. The average survival was 8.1 months in the patients who received both nab-paclitaxel and CC-486. Serious side effects were noticed in 31.6% of the patients who only received nab-paclitaxel. Serious side effects were noticed in 40.5% of the patients who received both nab-paclitaxel and CC-486. These side effects included feeling sick, vomiting, and tingling or losing sensation in the fingers and toes.

The authors concluded that adding CC-486 to nab-paclitaxel treatment did not have a benefit to survival in treatment of advanced non-small cell lung cancer.

This study is small, and should be repeated again with more patients.