For women who have had triple negative breast cancer and have a mutation in the Brca genes, the targeted drug olaparib has been shown to reduce the risk of relapse or new cancer by 42% compared to placebo in adjuvant treatment, i.e. after surgery. It is the first target therapy for those with a Brca germline mutation to show clinical benefit at this stage of treatment by increasing disease-free survival.
The data comes from the OlympiA study, presented in plenary session at the American Society of Clinical Oncology Congress that closes today, and published in the New England Journal of Medicine. In the study population, consisting of patients who had completed local treatment and standard neoadjuvant or adjuvant chemotherapy. At three years, 85.9% of patients treated with olaparib are still alive and free from invasive breast and other cancers, compared with 77.1% in the placebo group.
In Italy it is estimated that, in 2020, over 55,000 women received a diagnosis of breast cancer and the presence of a BRCA mutation is detected in about 5% of patients. “In the presence of a BRCA mutation, breast cancer tends to occur in a population younger than the average age of diagnosis”, explains Michelino De Laurentiis, Director of the Department of Breast Health of the Pascale Cancer Institute in Naples and Principal Investigator of the OlympiA study for Italy: “Despite the progress of research, the risk of relapse, even in an early setting, is very high and new targeted therapeutic approaches are needed that can help keep the disease at bay. Based on the first results of the OLYMPIA study presented at the ASCO Congress, olaparib has the potential to be used in addition to all standard initial breast cancer treatments, providing an additional and lasting clinical benefit. ” Olaparib also reduced the risk of distant recurrence (metastasis) or death by 43%, but longer follow-up is needed to determine whether there is also a statistically significant increase in overall survival.
“These new results support the importance of the diagnostic test for BRCA1 / 2 mutations, which allow for better patient care and at the same time provide useful information for her family members”, underlines Laura Cortesi, Head of the Oncological Genetics at the Department of Oncology of the University Hospital of Modena and member of the working group for the drafting of recommendations for the implementation of the BRCA test in patients with breast cancer. Olaparib is currently available in Italy for the treatment, in the presence of the BRCA mutation, of metastatic triple negative breast cancer and advanced ovarian cancer on multiple lines of treatment.
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