nickysfight's Cancer Blog

March 25, 2008

Arenesp: Red Blood Cell Booster Drug

Views: 240

The most recent shot Mom received was Aranesp. It is given for patients who have developed Anemia or low red-blood cell counts due to chemotherapy treatments. This is the 2nd time she has received this shot. The first time was approximately a year ago. I want to ask Dr. Kane about the safety of the use of this medicine and if Mom should be receiving it. I found some troubling information about the safetyof this product which I have pasted below from the following link:

http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2008/02/27/anemia-drugs-raise-death-risk-for-cancer-patients/

Anemia Drugs Raise Death Risk for Cancer Patients
Posted by Jacob Goldstein

More bad news for anemia drugs. Aranesp and Procrit (also known as Epogen) increase the risk of death for cancer patients, according to an analysis published in the current issue of JAMA.

The authors crunched data from 51 clinical trials and concluded that cancer patients who received the drugs to fight fatigue and avoid transfusions had a risk of death that was roughly 10% higher than patients who received a placebo. The patients taking anemia drugs increased the risk of blood clots in the veins.

“These risks have been previously defined,” Roger Perlmutter, Amgen’s executive vice president of research and development, told the WSJ. “There are benefits associated with use of these drugs, and there are risks.” Amgen sells Aranesp and Epogen; J&J sells Procrit.

Some of the key trials included in the analysis treated patients more aggressively than current guidelines recommend, and it’s unclear whether the drugs increase the risk of death when used as recommended, Credit Suisse analyst Catherine Arnold said in a note this morning. “t can be argued that these results are somewhat irrelevant,” she wrote.

Still, the finding “will fuel FDA’s concerns regarding potential harm to cancer patients and raise the potential for substantial restrictions in the label,” Arnold said. The drugs’ labels were updated twice last year to include new warnings, the WSJ notes. And an FDA advisory committee is meeting next month to consider recommending more warnings in light of recent findings.

Dr. Kane may advise that the positive benefits of this drug outweigh the negative risks but I want to check with her just to make sure. It doesn’t appear that the white blood-cell boosing drugs such as Neulasta and Neumega have the same negative risks. However, I’m thinking I may need to do a little more research just to make sure.!