A new oral drug Palbociclib, whose efficacy in combating breast cancer has been demonstrated alone and in combination with endocrine therapy also has potential to fight other types of cancer, new research has found. Palbociclib is a newly developed drug that received breakthrough designation and recent US Food and Drug Administration approval in combination with endocrine therapy in the treatment of hormone receptor positive, ERBB2-negative (formerly HER2 or HER2/neu) breast cancer in the first-line metastatic setting. Palbociclib is a potent and specific oral cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK) 4/6 inhibitor that has strong preclinical data to support its activity in retinoblastoma protein–expressing tumors.
The key event in all tumor progression is the rapid cellular division which is regulated by CDKs. Therefore, amplification of CDK4 is reported in a high percentage of melanomas and…
