Early findings suggest new drug could be 'gamechanging' to treat brain cancer

Two patients with advanced brain cancer have responded well in a small experimental trial of combining chemo and immunotherapy drugs.

In one situation, the life-threatening tumour appears to have gone, The Guardian reported.

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However, researchers at the Institute of Cancer Research and the Royal Marsden hospital in London have stressed that these are early days but added that it was unusual that such a positive response has been generated in the early trial.

In the phase 1 trial named Ice-Cap, ten people were enrolled who had advance glioblastoma, a tumour similar to the one that killed US President Joe Biden's son Beau.

Two patients responded to the immunotherapy agent atezolizumab combined with ipatasertib.

Ipatasertib is a new precision drug that may have the potential to uncloak tumours to the immune system.

A majority of patients in the trial had tumours with defects in a gene called Pten and in four cases, including the two people who responded very well, the Pten gene did not work at all.

"Brain cancer is able to evade the immune system in complex ways and, until now, immunotherapy has not worked. However, by uncloaking the disease using a new drug called ipatasertib, this study suggests that we could make some brain cancers vulnerable to atezolizumab," Dr Juanita Lopez, who led the study said.

"We believe that our findings open the door to the further development of what could become a gamechanging treatment option for some patients with aggressive glioblastoma brain cancer. Patients with glioblastoma have very poor survival rates, and even fewer new treatment options coming through, so any advance in outcomes would be extremely welcome."