Astex Pharma Reports Oral Presentation Of SGI-110 AML Data - Quick Facts

(RTTNews) - Astex Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (ASTX) announced that detailed clinical responses and biomarkers data of relapsed/refractory AML (r/r AML) patients treated in the Phase 1 part of the SGI-110-01 trial were presented at the European Cancer Congress in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The data were presented in the Oral Papers Session of Hematological Malignancies on Saturday, September 28, by Professor Jean-Pierre Issa, MD, Director, Fels Institute for Cancer and Molecular Biology, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA.

The presentation demonstrated that of the 50 heavily pre-treated Phase 1 AML patients with LINE-1 DNA methylation data, there were 5 Complete Responses, or 10%. There were no responders in the 31 patients who had LINE-1 DNA demethylation of less than 10% after treatment, whereas all 5 responders were in the 19 patients who had LINE-1 demethylation of at least 10%. The median duration of response was around 4 months, and two responders had complete responses for approximately 1 and 1.5 years.

Out of the 5 responders, two had prior hypomethylating agent treatment, and two patients had prior bone marrow transplants. Patients with low baseline DNMT-3b expression seemed to correlate with better LINE-1 demethylation and response, the company added. The first data from the Phase 2 AML patients in both r/r AML and treatment-naïve elderly AML were submitted for presentation at the upcoming 2013 American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting, December 7-10, New Orleans, LA.

SGI-110 is a novel small molecule, DNA-hypomethylating agent administered as a single low volume subcutaneous injection.