Pazopanib shrinks lung cancers before surgery

Pazopanib, a new oral angiogenesis inhibitor, has demonstrated interesting activity in difficult to treat non-small-cell lung cancer, US scientists report.

In a phase II trial, 30 out of 35 patients treated with preoperative pazopanib for a minimum of two weeks saw their tumor size shrink by up to 85%.

"This is a positive result that will be explored further," said Prof. Nasser Altorki from Weil Medical College of Cornell University in New York.

"To my knowledge, no other results on the effect of angiogenesis inhibitors in early stage operable lung cancer have been published.

The results presented here with pazopanib indicate a highly active drug in this setting and further development in lung cancer is underway to fully understand the value of this drug in this disease".