But Gleevec only helps in two relatively uncommon tumors, chronic myeloid leukemia and stomach lining cancers.
Sidney Harman died last night of complications from acute myeloid leukemia at the young age of almost 93.
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In about one-third of patients, the disease progresses to become acute myeloid leukemia.
However, analyzing the data from another study indicated that elesclomol was highly active against cells from acute myeloid leukemia (AML).
Based on the trial, Novartis plans to apply next year for approval to market Tasigna for initial therapy for chronic myeloid leukemia.
He points to Gleevec, a drug that boosted the survival rate of patients with chronic myeloid leukemia to about 90% from 20% to 25%.
This is an unusual activty as acute myeloid leukemia is characterized by progressively shorter remission periods regardless of the drug regimen, says the analyst.
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Novartis is in final trials of a drug that may help the one-third of acute myeloid leukemia cases with a gene mutation that turns on cell-growth signals.
The first of its two clinical-stage product candidates is a potential treatment for acute myeloid leukemia, a cancer that receives about 14, 000 new diagnoses in the U.S. annually.
Another compound, in middle-stage testing, targets acute myeloid leukemia.
Oncology is attractive not only because of the huge need for better drugs but also because that's where the impact of the human genome project has been greatest, yielding targeted drugs such as Genentech's Herceptin for breast cancer and Novartis' Gleevec for chronic myeloid leukemia.
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