Noxopharm (ASX:NOX) has received Notices of Allowance from patent offices in Australia and Europe covering the use of idronoxil (the active ingredient in Veyonda) as a chemo-enhancing drug and announced the dosing of the first patient in a new trial.
The company said the patent relates to the use of Veyonda to allow dosages of chemotherapy to be lowered to safer levels without compromising their anti-cancer effectiveness.
The company said it is confident the combination can deliver an even stronger anti-cancer response at the same time as offering the safer benefit.
The patent - ‘Chemotherapy improvements’ (AU:2017254774) - covers a method of treating or preventing cancer by administering Veyonda with a low dose (up to 90 per cent of a therapeutic dose) of chemotherapy drugs belonging to the platinum or taxane families or a combination thereof.
The patent valid until at least 21 April 2037. The patent remains under examination in the U.S.
Noxopharm CEO Graham Kelly, said, “A high proportion of cancer patients are deprived of the benefits of chemotherapies because of toxic side-effects.
"The development of side-effects leads to drug dosages being lowered or stopped altogether. Other patients either are too ill or too elderly or just unwilling to even start chemotherapy.
"That is the gap that we see Veyonda filling by allowing the patient to still gain the benefit of the chemotherapy but at dosages that are much better tolerated. With an estimated US$150 billion spent globally each year on chemotherapy, that gap represents a very major medical need and commercial opportunity."
Noxopharm also announced the commencement of treatment of the first patient in the IONIC-1 trial that is studying Veyonda in combination with Bristol Myers Squibb's Opdivo (nivolumab) for the treatment of a range of tumour types.