Early Data on Neoadjuvant Olaparib in Ovarian Cancer

Neoadjuvant treatment with olaparib (Lynparza) prior to surgical resection and adjuvant chemotherapy was well tolerated and associated with a 100% optimal resection rate in patients with newly diagnosed, BRCA-mutant ovarian, primary peritoneal, or fallopian tube cancer, according to findings from the phase I NOW trial presented at the Society of Gynecologic Oncology annual meeting.

In this exclusive MedPage Today video, Paul DiSilvestro, MD, director of the women’s oncology program at Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island, discusses the importance of the new strategy.

Following is a transcript of his remarks:

I found at this meeting there was a very compelling study looking at the role of olaparib, or a PARP inhibitor, in neoadjuvant treatment of ovarian cancer.

This really changes the paradigm for the way we conceptualize treatment of ovarian cancer, which is standardly combination cytotoxic chemotherapy. In this setting, we’ve gone completely away from that and used a targeted agent as the sole treatment before women were operated on.

Initial results are very, in my perspective, compelling for this strategy. Obviously, it’s got to be expanded to more people. I don’t remember the exact numbers, but it was somewhere in the 15 to 20 person range of total enrollees.

So we look forward to further development of that, and that’s an exciting concept from this meeting.