Prostate Cancer Immunotherapy PROVENGE Shows Median Survival of Nearly 4 Years 

A California based biopharmaceutical company announced the publication of clinical study results in evaluating real-world use of PROVENGE® (sipuleucel-T) in men with asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic metastatic castrate-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) had a median survival of nearly 4 years.

Dendreon Pharmaceuticals said in a September 4, 2019, press release that ‘PROVENGE (sipuleucel-T) is the only FDA-approved cancer immunotherapy made from a patient’s own immune cells for the treatment of prostate cancer.’

PROVENGE is an autologous cellular immunotherapy indicated for the treatment of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic metastatic castrate-resistant prostate cancer.

Notably, this study showed 44 percent of patients with a Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA) of <5.27 ng/mL did not receive any additional cancer treatments for at least 1 year.

“The median survival of 4 years following treatment with PROVENGE is meaningful,” said Celestia S. Higano, M.D., FACP, lead author of the PROCEED analysis, and professor, Division of Medical Oncology, Department of Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.

Bruce A. Brown, M.D., chief medical officer at Dendreon said in this press release, “Of the nearly 2,000 patients enrolled in PROCEED between 2011-2014 a quarter had a PSA of <5.27 ng/mL, and these men lived much longer than those in the higher quartiles.” 

PROCEED Registry – Baseline PSA and Median Survival

• <5.27 ng/mL – 47.7 months
• >5.27 to ≤15.08 ng/mL – 33.2 months
• >15.08 to ≤ 46 ng/mL – 27.2 months
• >46 ng/mL – 18.4 months

The findings from the PROCEED registry are consistent with a previous posthoc analysis of the pivotal Phase 3 IMPACT trial of sipuleucel-T published in Urology in 2013. 

In that analysis, a lower baseline PSA level was associated with improved overall survival (OS). Among patients with a baseline PSA ≤22.1 ng/mL, the median OS was 41.3 months (3.4 years) for those treated with sipuleucel-T vs. 28.3 months for those in the control arm – an improvement of 13 months.

This is important news since the American Cancer Society estimates prostate cancer-related fatalities in the United States for 2019 will exceed 31,620 men.

With the state of California forecasted to report 4,470 fatalities in 2019.

Prostate cancer, however, is detectable and treatable.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid provides coverage of 2 screening tools for the early detection of prostate cancer for eligible beneficiaries.

Medicare provides coverage for Digital Rectal Exams and Prostate Specific Antigen blood tests once every 12 months for male beneficiaries aged 50 and older. 

Private PSA Test available from Ulta Labs

Dendreon is a commercial-stage biopharmaceutical company and is the only company in the U.S. with an FDA-approved active cellular immunotherapy for a solid tumor. For more information, please visit Dendreon.

Published by Vax Before Cancer