Micromet Has Started a New Phase 2 Trial with Adecatumumab in Colorectal Cance...( Randomized Controlled Multicenter Tri...),Health

Randomized, Controlled, Multicenter Trial Will Test Ability of Adecatumumab to Prolong Disease Free Survival in High Risk Patients with Liver Metastases

BETHESDA, Md., March 23 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Micromet, Inc. (Nasdaq: MITI), a biopharmaceutical company developing novel, proprietary antibodies for the treatment of cancer, inflammation and autoimmune diseases, today announced the commencement of a randomized, controlled phase 2 trial of its human anti-EpCAM IgG1 antibody adecatumumab (MT201) for the treatment of patients with colorectal cancer (CRC) after complete resection of liver metastases. The trial has three arms comparing single agent adecatumumab to combination chemotherapy (FOLFOX: 5-FU/Leucovorin plus Oxaliplatin), and to FOLFOX followed by adecatumumab. The primary endpoint will be the disease-free survival rate at one year.

"The relapse of colorectal cancer patients with liver metastases still represents an area with very high medical need" said the trial's principle investigator, Professor Peter Neuhaus, from the Charite University Hospital in Berlin, Germany. "Recent intensification of chemotherapeutic regimens has shown only modest benefit and there is significant room for improvement in these patients. EpCAM is a cancer target which is highly expressed in colorectal cancer, and targeted therapies such as adecatumumab could become a major breakthrough in this setting if proven successful."

Apart from being the most highly and frequently expressed target antigen on colorectal cancer cells, EpCAM has recently been shown to drive tumor growth and to be expressed on colorectal cancer stem cells (1). The ability of adecatumumab to potentially control and eliminate newly developing metastases has been suggested in a recently reported Phase 2 trial of adecatumumab as monotherapy in metastatic
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