05/14/2018

Recent Oncology Related FDA Approvals/Changes

• FDA approved Retacrit (epoetin alfa-epbx, Hospira Inc., a subsidiary of Pfizer Inc.) as a biosimilar to Epogen/Procrit (epoetin alfa, Amgen Inc.) for the treatment of anemia due to chronic kidney disease (CKD) in patients on dialysis and not on dialysis, use of zidovudine in patients with HIV infection, and the effects of concomitant myelosuppressive chemotherapy. It is also approved for the reduction of allogeneic red blood cell transfusions in patients undergoing elective, noncardiac, nonvascular surgery. More Information.  May 15, 2018 (1)

• FDA approves dabrafenib plus trametinib for anaplastic thyroid cancer with BRAF V600E mutation. More Information. May 4, 2018. (1)

• FDA approved tisagenlecleucel (KYMRIAH, Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp.) a CD19-directed genetically modified autologous T-cell immunotherapy, for adult patients with relapsed or refractory large B-cell lymphoma after two or more lines of systemic therapy including diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) not otherwise specified, high grade B-cell lymphoma and DLBCL arising from follicular lymphoma. More Information.  May 1, 2018. 

• FDA granted regular approval to dabrafenib (TAFINLAR, Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp.) and trametinib (MEKINIST, Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp.) in combination for the adjuvant treatment of patients with melanoma with BRAF V600E or V600K mutations, as detected by an FDA-approved test, and involvement of lymph node(s), following complete resection.  More Information. April 30, 2018 (2)

• FDA approved osimertinib (Tagrisso, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals LP) for the first-line treatment of patients with metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose tumors have epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) exon 19 deletions or exon 21 L858R mutations, as detected by an FDA-approved test.  More Information.  April 19, 2018 (2)

• FDA approved fostamatinib disodium hexahydrate tablets (TAVALISSE, Rigel Pharmaceuticals, Inc.) for the treatment of thrombocytopenia in adult patients with chronic immune thrombocytopenia (ITP) who have had an insufficient response to a previous treatment. More Information.  April 17, 2018 (2)