Fda, Breast Cancer | featured news

The Food and Drug Administration says it has approved a new form of a best-selling breast cancer drug that targets tumor cells while sparing healthy ones. The drug Kadcyla (kad-SY'-luh) from Roche combines the established drug Herceptin with a powerful chemotherapy drug and a third chemical linking the medicines together. The chemical keeps the cocktail intact until it binds to a cancer cell, delivering a double-shot of anti-tumor poison.

If you want the FDA to approve more innovative, new drugs based on promising but early clinical results, you have to give the FDA a way to revoke those approvals later on, should larger trials prove that those drugs aren't as safe or effective as they first seemed. This is why the FDA should be congratulated for the way it has handled the Avastin breast cancer saga, and why I hope we will see the FDA handle more cases like this one, not less.

Federal health regulators have concerns about bladder and breast cancer seen in patients taking an experimental diabetes pill from Bristol-Myers ...

The best-selling cancer drug in the world comes under federal scrutiny as drugmaker Roche makes a last-ditch effort to keep Avastin approved ...

The FDA said it is recommending that Roche's Avastin no longer be approved for treatment of breast cancer.