A trial of PaTrin 2 for operable breast, prostate, brain or bowel cancer (PH1/087)

Cancer type:

Bowel (colorectal) cancer

Brain (and spinal cord) tumours

Breast cancer

Prostate cancer

Status:

Results

Phase:

Phase 1

This trial was looking at PaTrin 2 for people who were due to have surgery to remove their breast, prostate, brain or bowel cancer. This trial was supported by Cancer Research UK.

Chemotherapy kills cancer cells by damaging their genetic material (DNA). But a protein called ATase helps cancer cells to repair their damaged DNA. Doctors hope that if PaTrin 2 reduces the amount of ATase in cancer cells, the cells will not be able to repair themselves.

PaTrin 2 is not an active drug on its own so the people taking part did not get any direct benefit from taking part in this trial. But they hoped that results may help other patients in the future.

The aims of this trial were to find out

The best dose of PaTrin 2 to reduce the level of ATase in cancer cells
What the side effects are

Summary of results

The research team found that PaTrin 2 could reduce ATase in cancer cells. They also found that it caused very few side effects.

The research team looked at the results of 36 people. All the people who took part had one dose of PaTrin 2 about 12 hours before they were due to have surgery to remove their cancer.

The first few people had the lowest dose of PaTrin 2. The next few people had a higher dose. And so on, until the research team found the best dose to give. This is called a dose escalation study.

The research team found that the more PaTrin 2 people had, the lower the ATase level was in their cancer cells. And that there was no ATase in the cells of the people who took the highest dose.

The people taking part had very few side effects, and no one had any severe side effects. Three people had mild side effects which were possibly, but not definitely, related to PaTrin 2. One person had a warm feeling in their abdomen. And 2 had higher than normal levels of liver enzymes for a few weeks.

As PaTrin 2 did lower the level of ATase in cancer cells, it could be looked at in future research, possibly in combination with other drugs.

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.