Breakthrough Melanoma Drug
YervoyTM is a new treatment for melanoma that harnesses the power of a patient’s own immune system to fight off the cancer.
Approved by the Food and Drug Administration on March 25, 2011, Yervoy is the first FDA-approved therapy for inoperable or metastatic melanoma in more than a decade. According to the distributor of the drug, CTCA is the first facility in Oklahoma to use Yervoy.
Metastatic melanoma is the deadliest form of skin cancer and occurs when cancer spreads beyond the surface of the skin to other organs. Melanoma is mostly curable when treated in its early stages. However, in its late stages, the average survival rate is just six months with a one-year mortality rate of 75 percent, making it one of the most aggressive forms of cancer.
One of an emerging class of treatments known as immunotherapy, Yervoy treats a patient’s immune system rather than treating the tumor directly. The drug works by blocking a protein on the surface of the body’s T cells that inhibits the cells’ action, essentially disabling a brake on the immune system. Yervoy is administered in four 90-minute infusions over three months.
Yervoy is the first and only FDA-approved therapy to demonstrate a significant improvement in overall survival for patients with late-stage melanoma. Research studies from the drug’s manufacturer, Bristol-Meyers Squibb, found that patients using Yervoy had a median survival of 10 months compared to six months in the control group. The estimated survival rate for Yervoy patients at one year was 46 percent and was 25 percent at two years, compared to 24 percent at one year and 14 percent at two years in the non-Yervoy control group; however,CTCA does not have enough results to date to confirm those from the manufacturer’s study.