The U.S. FDA has given the green light to AstraZeneca’s drug Lynparza for treating patients with metastasized breast cancer who have either BRCA genes linked to the disease.
The drug has already been approved for use in patients with ovarian cancers caused by mutations of the BRCA genes. The expanded indication makes Lynparza the first targeted therapy for patients with an advanced, genetically driven form of the disease.
The move comes after promising results from a clinical trial involving 302 breast cancer patients with a BRCA mutation. In the trial, the cancer did not progress for seven months in patients who took Lynparza, compared to 4.2 months in patients only given chemotherapy.
AstraZeneca is striving to gain approval for at least six new cancer drugs by 2020.