Dendreon Initiates Phase 1 Clinical Trial of Small Molecule Targeting TRPM8...( SEATTLE April 21 /- Dendreon Corporat...),Health

SEATTLE, April 21 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Dendreon Corporation (Nasdaq: DNDN) today announced that the Company has enrolled the first patient in a Phase 1 clinical trial of D3263 in patients with advanced cancer. D3263 is Dendreon's lead small molecule drug candidate designed to target TRPM8 (a transmembrane cation channel protein) in cancer cells and induce cell death. The trial is an open-label, dose-escalation study evaluating the safety and pharmacokinetics of orally-administered D3263 in patients with solid tumors that are refractory to standard therapies.

The Phase 1 trial will enroll three to six patients per cohort during the dose escalation phase of the study. An expansion cohort may be enrolled following determination of the maximum tolerated dose. The primary endpoint of the study will be safety, but patients also will be evaluated for anti-tumor activity as well as tolerance of the drug in order to determine the optimal schedule and level of dosing. The trial has been initiated at South Texas Accelerated Research Therapeutics (START) in San Antonio Texas under the direction of Dr. Anthony W. Tolcher.

"D3263 is a drug candidate that has potential applicability to multiple types of cancer as well as to benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH)," stated Mark Frohlich, M.D., senior vice president of clinical affairs and chief medical officer of Dendreon. "The ability of D3263 to inhibit growth of TRPM8 expressing tumors in preclinical studies coupled with its oral bioavailability make it an appealing product candidate to advance into human clinical trials."

Patients interested in additional information about this trial may visit www.clinicaltrials.gov and use the search term "D3263."

About TRPM8

TRPM8 (also known a
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