New research shows potential targeted therapy for metastatic, androgen receptor positive, breast cancer

Results from an open label clinical study, evaluating an oral daily dose of the drug enobosarm, shows promise for women with metastatic, androgen receptor positive, estrogen receptor positive breast cancer. 

The new data is from a phase 2 study to be reported on Monday, June 2, 2014 at the meeting in Chicago of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) by Beth Overmoyer, MD, director of the Inflammatory Breast Cancer Program at the Susan F. Smith Center for Women’s Cancers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

“We are very encouraged by our findings,” said Overmoyer. “This drug is tissue specific, so many of the side effects normally experienced by patients on endocrine therapy did not occur. We only encountered rare nausea and minimal muscle aches.”

Enobosarm is an oral, nonsteroidal selective androgen receptor modulator (SARM) that has been developed for its selective androgenic activity with minimal side effects.  More than 80% of estrogen receptor positive metastatic breast cancer is androgen receptor positive, supporting the development of targeted therapy for the androgen receptor in this patient population.

In addition to treating metastatic breast cancer, enobosarm is also being tested to benefit the prevention and treatment of a wide variety of muscle wasting conditions and other cancers.

This study was supported in part by GTx, Inc. who provided drug and clinical trial support.