AstraZeneca announced the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a new indication for Faslodex (fulvestrant), expanding the indication to include use with abemaciclib, a CDK4/6 inhibitor, for the treatment of hormone receptor-positive (HR+), human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 negative (HER2-) advanced or metastatic breast cancer (MBC) in women with disease progression after endocrine therapy.
“Faslodex has long been an effective monotherapy option for women with hormone receptor positive breast cancer, which is the most common type of advanced breast cancer. Today’s decision builds upon the recent approval for Faslodex in the first-line advanced setting and is supported by strong evidence to use this medicine within a combination therapy for advanced breast cancer,” Dave Fredrickson, Executive Vice President, Head of the Oncology Business Unit at AstraZeneca, said. “Combining Faslodex with abemaciclib provides patients with another effective, non-chemotherapy option to combat this disease.”
The FDA approval is based on data from the Phase III MONARCH 2 trial, which met the study’s primary endpoint of PFS.
The trial included 669 women with HR+, HER2- advanced breast cancer. The results showed a statistically significant increase in investigator-assessed median PFS of 7.1 months (16.4 months vs 9.3 months) in patients who received Faslodex 500 mg and abemaciclib 150 mg over Faslodex and placebo (HR: 0.553; 95% CI: 0.449-0.681; p<0.0001).
This expanded indication for Faslodex is the second FDA approval for Faslodex in combination with a CDK4/6 inhibitor. Faslodex has been licensed in the US since 2016 for use with the CDK4/6 inhibitor, palbociclib, for the treatment of women with HR+, HER2-negative MBC, whose cancer has progressed after endocrine therapy.