Ixempra (Ixabepilone) for Metastatic Breast Cancer

As the good people over at the WSJ Health Blog tell us, at a time when “targeted” cancer treatments like Herceptin and Gleevec are all the rage, chemotherapy can seem like a retro blunderbuss. The FDA’s approval of a Bristol-Myers Squibb drug harkens back to the old-school for breast cancer patients who aren’t responding to other treatments.

Ixempra would be the first in a new class of chemotherapy drugs called epothilones. The medicine, which is injected, works by inhibiting tubulin, a protein that acts like a scaffold inside cancer cells and is necessary for their proliferation. Known generically as ixabepilone, the drug tries to stymie tumors by keeping cancer cells from replicating successfully. Ixempra would be used alone or in combination with Xeloda, in patients who have failed two or three other chemo drugs.

For use by women who have tried – without success – prior types of treatment? Why not give them the “right” drug or combinations the “first” time around? Why not have a bio-marker to aid the physician in selecting an effective agent or combination of agents the first time around, to avoid exposing the patient to ineffective harmful drugs, reducing the cost and decreased quality of life associated with ineffective treatment? Everyone would agree that the earlier in the course of the disease that the most active treatment is given, the better the result for the patient.

The downside of Ixempra is that chemo that goes after dividing cells, also attacks healthy cells along with cancerous ones. Ixempra’s side effects include fatigue, hair loss and anorexia. Patients may experience a decrease in red blood cells, muscle pain, joint pain, the feeling of pins and needles in their fingers and toes, and in severe cases, inability to use their hands and feet fully. Does Taxol sound familiar?

Scores of “new” cancer drug applications are for me-too drugs which might show only miniscule clinical improvement in trials, yet they somehow gain approval. So, for 1.6 months longer, patients can suffer from one or all of the above and still end up dead. Since they are marketed as if they were important new breakthroughs, they have very high prices. For most patients the total cost of a full course of Ixempra is expected to run from $18,440 to $23,050. Does that sound familiar, too?

I am sure that the person that wrote the last part doesn’t have a love one suffering from cancer like my daughter does and and so many women and have no other options. One thing is be informative, other is just plain insensitive with no a truly knowledge of the results of this new treatment.
My daughter starting this treatment next week and I hope you are terrible wrong.

Unfortunately, I have an understanding of what this experience is like with a loved one. I was a spouse/caregiver to a cancer patient. I became intensely interested in cancer medicine by virtue of working through, enduring and surviving my wife’s illness. I’ve never felt that being practical and thought provoking as being insensitive.

Ixempra would be used alone or in combination with Xeloda, in patients who have failed two or three other chemo drugs, instead of identifying the most effective chemotherapy for the individual cancer patient, the first time around.

There is no proven standard first-line therapy which has been shown to be superior to the many other choices which exist. The same situation exists in the setting of 2nd, 3rd, 4th line therapy. The therapies are equivalent on a population basis, but not on an individual basis. Patients should receive the correct treatment in the first-line setting.

My sister was given ixempra and it has made her very ill. The first time she took it it made her mildly nauseous. The 2nd time she became extremely weak and nauseous all for about a week after. She complained to her Dr. but he was busy planning his vacation. They gave her a third treatment and it has totally incapacitated her. After two weeks she is so ill she doesn’t get up out of bed. She wasn’t able to eat for more than 6 days and had to receive IV fluids. After 3 days she is back to being very weak and nauseous agagin. She had to give up her independence including her job and apt and move in with me. Be careful with Ixempra. It may work for some, but for others it doesn’t.

After 18 years of having breast cancer, my sister is Stage IV and it metastasized to her brain and her lungs. They gave her radiation for her brain, and as a last resort, Ixempra, which didn’t work. Her Onc put her on another chemo med (forgot the name), and told her chances are 15% that this chemo will work. She’s not eating, is weak, has congestion in her lungs, and he told her she needs to contact at home hospice now. Is there anything else she can take? Any other combination of meds?

I am having Ixempra chemo right now. I have completed my third round. I am totally incapacitated by this drug. At first we were doing Xeloda in addition. It was way too harsh on my digestion track. Stopped it but continue to have several bad side effects. You name them,, I have them all. I am not aquitter this is my thirtd occurrence since 2007. But I dont think i can do any,more of this drug.