Patients, doctors hail 'revolutionary' new drug for pancreatic cancer
Last summer, Megan Chung was given one more year to live.
Chung, a mother of three college-age kids from west suburban Hinsdale, was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in April 2024. The disease — one of the most devastating and deadly cancers that kills roughly 50,000 people in the U.S. annually — had already advanced and an inoperable tumor was crushing her intestines.
"When you're diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, 'I'm really sorry' is the first thing your doctor says," Chung, 55, said.
The most aggressive chemotherapy treatments often only provide patients minimal time, about four to six months. Chung went through six months of chemotherapy, then radiation and surgery. She was briefly disease free, but then it came back — a typical and brutal reality with pancreatic cancer.
Soon after that, she got into a clinical trial at the University of Chicago for a drug now considered to be the most promising treatment for pancreatic cancer in a long time.
"It was pretty miraculous," Chung said.
That drug is called daraxonrasib. The treatment — not yet approved for use but nearing regulatory approval — is the first to considerably extend the lives of people with pancreatic cancer.
Dr. Ardaman Shergill, an oncologist who specializes in pancreatic cancer at UChicago Medicine, called the drug "revolutionary."
"This is going to change everything for pancreatic cancer," Shergill told the Sun-Times. "Where we go from here is endless."
Daraxonrasib is a pill taken three times a day. The Food and Drug Administration recently granted Revolution Medicines, the company behind the drug, permission to give some patients access to the drug through a regulatory shortcut called expanded access.
The drug's success comes from its ability to target a specific mutation within pancreatic cancer cells that occurs in more than 90% of cases, Shergill said.
"That mutation is foundational to pancreatic cancer," Shergill said. "After a very long time, we have a pill that targets that mutation."
The method of targeting that specific mutation, called KRAS, is so promising that similar drugs targeting the mutation are currently being tested for other cancers, including lung and colon.
Patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer who have "previously been treated" are eligible to receive the drug, according to the FDA. The drug maker will provide the drug for free, as is common practice with expanded access.
Two recent clinical trials generated the most encouraging results ever seen for a pancreatic cancer treatment.
One of those trials for the pill was a large global study that included patients at UChicago. Shergill oversaw the trial at the medical center.
Patients who had previously been treated were randomly given either daraxonrasib or a second round of a standard treatment, Shergill said.
The drug more than doubled patient survival rates, Shergill said. The survival rate for the standard chemotherapy treatment was six months. Patients who received the new drug got 13 more months of life on average.
"It's not five to 10 years. But it's really great and more than double the standard treatment," Shergill said. "We're getting survivals at levels we haven't seen before."
The researchers behind the drug are presenting their latest findings this weekend at the American Society of Clinical Oncology conference in Chicago.
The drug still needs full approval from the FDA before it can be available to all patients. Shergill said she expects that to happen by the end of this summer or the fall.
Since the FDA's decision to expand access, Shergill and her colleagues at UChicago and across the country received a flood of messages asking about the drug.
"It's pivotal," she said. "It’s not something patients with pancreatic cancer have seen in a really long time."
Chung, who used to work as a physician, was thrilled when she was randomly assigned the drug. Taking a pill three times a day was far better than eight hours tied to a chemo IV drip.
The side effects have also been far more manageable compared to chemo. She developed a rash that she's been able to get treated.
"Comparatively, it's been so much better," Chung said. "Well first of all, I'm alive. Most treatments give you four to six months. And I've gotten a whole 'nother year."
That extra year has been a blessing. Chung and her family traveled to Korea to visit relatives. She was able to help her daughter move into her college dorm in Boston and attend family weekend — something she missed out on when her twin sons went off to school because she was too sick to travel.
The drug gave her time that chemotherapy couldn't, but it isn't a cure. Chung is well aware that her extra year is coming to an end. She started taking the drug last June.
"You worry most about disrupting your family's life," she said. "Like whether you should bring your kids home from college to keep them home with you. What is the right time to do that when you have a terminal diagnosis?"
Chung said she's comforted by her faith and she's blessed to have a close family and strong, supportive community.
She worries that funding cuts to research will impact major advancements like daraxonrasib.
"They were working on targeting this protein for a long, long time," she said. "All this research that occurs in these obscure labs and all these different places is so important."
"We cannot curtail research," she said.
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