Theralase Is still Flying Under the RadarI guess the 29 cent stock price is a pretty good clue.
TLD-1433 as a potential bladder cancer treatment still has such a low profile that the most prominent member of
Theralase's Medical and Science Advisory Board,
Dr. Ashish Kamat makes no mention of
TLD1433 in his recent interview about bladder cancer at the
EAU222 conference, even after being specifically asked about "
new kids on the block". But, as ScienceFirst is always emphasizing, it's all about the data. As our data becomes increasingly persuasive I trust
Dr. Kamat will begin to include
TLD1433 when he talks about "
exciting drugs that we should all be looking at." On the plus side, he does acknowledge that a safe intravesical treatment is a better choice then
Keytruda (pembrolizumab).
"I was part of the group that got pembrolizumab approved when it went in front of the FDA. But you also have to remember that the efficacy of pembrolizumab is roughly about 20%, right? So when we talk to our patients and give them the option of a 20% response rate with a systemic drug that potentially has toxicity, versus intravesical therapies such as combination chemotherapy which is the defacto standard in the US, patients make the decision that's right for them and tend to choose the intravesical therapy. I don't think it's just a urology - medical oncology thing, I think it's truly based on the data." EAUTV: Profs. Morgan Roupret and Ashish Kamat discuss Bladder Cancer At 6 minutes 37 seconds: Prof. Morgan Roupret:
We have also some new kids on the block in the pipeline can you let us know what you feel is going to be relevant for the patient and the physicians within the next few months?
Prof. Ashish Kamat
So I think one big thing is the nadofaragene gene therapy and that was studied and reported and the data seem fairly good. They're at least as good as pembrolizumab and much less toxicity that drug unfortunately has not yet been approved by the FDA partly because of manufacturing issues and not any trouble with the data so hopefully that's one.
The other one that's really exciting is the N803 - the Kolb study which was reported at GI ASCO and ASCO which is BCG plus the IL-15 superagonist and the response rates there seem almost too good to be true with very low toxicity. So clearly that is something that we're all excited about that has been filed with the FDA and we're waiting to see if it gets approved.
CG0070 which is oncolytic virus in combination with pembrolizumab again has been reported at ASCO and GI ASCO. Roger Li is the PI on that and that again has very high efficacy rates at six months and even nine months in patients that have been analyzed so that's another very exciting drug that we should all be looking at.