Drug for head and neck cancers has 'wonderful' results in trial

An immunotherapy drug can ward off head and neck cancers for twice as long as the standard treatment, in the biggest breakthrough in two decades.

- Andrew Gregory

Pembrolizumab stimulates the immune system to fight cancer, targeting a specific protein that enables the drug to wipe out cancer cells.

The drug kept cancer at bay in some patients for an average of five years, compared with 30 months when added to standard of care (the best-practice treatment), a clinical trial found. The results were presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the world's largest cancer conference.

The trial, with more than 700 patients across 192 sites in 24 countries, was led by the Washington University School of Medicine. Dr Douglas Adkins, the study's co-principal investigator and a professor of oncology, said the results were significant because it was the first time such a drug had generated this effect.