A trial of ASA404 and docetaxel for non small cell lung cancer that has continued to grow during chemotherapy or has come back after treatment (ATTRACT 2)

Cancer type:

Lung cancer

Non small cell lung cancer

Status:

Results

Phase:

Phase 3

This trial was looking at a drug called ASA404 in combination with the chemotherapy drug docetaxel for non small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) that was stage 3B or 4.

Doctors often use chemotherapy to treat NSCLC that is locally advanced Open a glossary item or has spread to another part of the body. If NSCLC continues to grow, or comes back after treatment, you may have more chemotherapy. Docetaxel is a drug that doctors may use.

Cancer cells need a blood supply to help them grow and survive. Growing cancer cells can encourage the growth of new blood vessels. This is called angiogenesis.

In this trial, researchers were looking at a drug called ASA404 which targets the cancer’s blood supply and might have helped to stop the cancer growing. They compared ASA404 with a dummy drug (a placebo Open a glossary item ). The aims of the trial were to

Find out if ASA404 worked better than the dummy drug, when you have it with docetaxel for NSCLC that had continued to grow during chemotherapy or had come back after treatment
Learn more about the side effects and how they affected people’s quality of life

Summary of results

The trial recruited 920 people who had non small cell lung cancer that was stage 3B or stage 4. Everybody taking part had already had chemotherapy, but their cancer had continued to grow or had come back after treatment.

460 people had docetaxel and ASA404
460 people had docetaxel and a dummy drug (placebo)

The researchers found that

The number of people whose cancer responded to the treatment was about the same in both groups
On average, the length of time people lived after treatment was about the same in both groups
The side effects were also similar in both groups

The trial team concluded that in this study, ASA404 did not work any better than the dummy drug and the trial was stopped early. There will not be any further trials planned for this drug.

We have based this summary on information from the team who ran the trial. As far as we are aware, the information they sent us has not been reviewed independently (peer reviewed Open a glossary item ) or published in a medical journal yet. The figures we quote above were provided by the trial team. We have not analysed the data ourselves.