Pancreatic Cancer

Pharmacor -- October 2007

  Introduction:

The majority of pancreatic cancer (PC) patients present with advanced disease, for which systemic therapy is the only therapeutic option. Even with drug treatment, median survival is less than one year. The disease therefore poses huge unmet need for more-effective therapies that can improve survival.

  Questions Answered in This Report:

Gemcitabine (Eli Lilly’s Gemzar) currently dominates the treatment of PC. What will be the impact of generic erosion on sales of this agent over the forecast period? Will gemcitabine lose out to new agents?

Erlotinib (Genentech/OSI/Roche/Chugai’s Tarceva) was the only new agent to be approved for PC in the past decade. What impact has this agent had on the market? What are its future prospects in PC? What do key opinion leaders think of this agent?

Because of the limited number of approved treatment options, various marketed cytotoxics are widely used off-label in PC in an attempt to improve outcomes. Which nonapproved agents are popular with oncologists? How extensive is their use? Are they used as monotherapies or in combination regimens?

The biologics bevacizumab (Roche/Genentech/Chugai’s Avastin) and cetuximab (ImClone Systems/Bristol-Myers Squibb/Merck KGaA’s Erbitux), which have proved highly successful for the treatment of colorectal cancer, are both under investigation for the treatment of PC. Do experts believe these antibodies will also make gains in survival of PC? Will high cost restrict their use? What is their sales potential?

We forecast that novel therapeutic vaccines will have reached the market by 2016. Which vaccines are most likely to launch? How will they be used in relation to existing therapies? What will be their impact on the PC market?

  Scope:

Markets covered: United States, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, United Kingdom, Japan.

Primary research: 22 country-specific interviews with thought-leading oncologists.

Epidemiology: Incidence and prevalence of local, regional, distant pancreatic cancer.

Population segments in market forecast: Resectable, advanced, and second-line patients.

 Emerging therapies: Phase II: 16 drugs; Phase III: 8 drugs. Coverage is included of 5 products in Phase I/II development.

Market forecast features: Using a proprietary patient-flow model, which accounts for survival and disease progression, we forecast population sizes and drug sales for resectable, advanced PC, and second-line treatment segments through 2016.

Alternative market scenarios: (1) If vaccines prove to be ineffective, (2) if vaccines are effective only as adjuvant treatment, (3) if capecitabine demonstrates better-than-anticipated improvement in survival, (4) impact of launch of a novel targeted small molecule.