More than a thousand women with advanced breast cancer are set to get ‘more time with loved ones’ after a new treatment was given the go-ahead on the NHS.
The once-a-day table, elacestrant, will be prescribed to women with a gene mutation that makes traditional hormone-based treatments less effective.
Its rollout should benefit around 1,100 women and comes less than two months after Nice initially rejected the drug in October.
Campaigners welcomed the U-turn but remain ‘deeply concerned’ many women with secondary disease are not getting the help the deserve under new criteria.
Earlier this year, another drug, Enhurtu, was denied on cost grounds, despite being available across large parts of Europe including Scotland, as well as the US, Australia and Japan.
Claire Rowney, chief executive of Breast Cancer Now, said ‘Today’s news is extremely welcome, but we remain deeply concerned that the system is not working in getting all secondary breast cancer drugs to the people who so badly need them.
‘We remain tireless in our efforts to ensure every person with secondary breast cancer can access the vital treatments that they both so desperately need and deserve.’
About eight in ten breast cancer cases are hormone receptor-positive (HR+), meaning it grows in response to hormones such as oestrogen.
The once-a-day table, elacestrant, will be prescribed to women with a gene mutation that makes traditional hormone-based treatments less effective
Its rollout should benefit around 1,100 women and comes less than two months after the drug was rejected in October
These cancers are commonly treated with hormone-based therapy, also called endocrine therapy.
However, up to half of patients will acquire mutations in the ESR1 gene that can render conventional hormone therapy less effective than in patients without the mutation.
This drives growth of the cancer even in the absence of oestrogen.
In people with this genetic mutation, elacestrant works by degrading the oestrogen receptors on tumour cells, which can help limit the cancer’s ability to grow and divide.
Helen Knight, director of medicines evaluation at Nice, said the decision had been made based on evidence from doctors and patients.
She said: ‘The committee understood that patients living with advanced breast cancer prioritise treatments that extend life, support quality of life, and delay the need for chemotherapy, while being safe and tolerable.
‘Elacestrant is a promising new treatment with the potential to address these priorities.’
Made by Menarini Stemline, genetic testing for the ESR1 mutation will be required to determine who is eligible.
It is recommended for patients whose cancer has worsened after at least a year of treatment with hormone therapy and CDK4/6 inhibitor, a drug that targets certain proteins on cancer cells to disrupt their growth.
