BerGenBio Announces Initiation of Phase 2a in First Line Non-Small Lung Cancer Patients with a STK11 mutation
BERGEN, Norway, March 20, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- BerGenBio ASA (OSE: BGBIO), a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing novel, selective AXL kinase inhibitors for severe unmet medical needs, announced today it has initiated the Phase 2a portion of the BGBC016 clinical study of its selective AXL inhibitor bemcentinib in combination with standard of care therapy in first-line Non Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC) patients harboring a STK11 mutation (STK11m).
- The initiation of Phase 2a follows a positive recommendation by the independent Drug Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB) which evaluated the safety of the combination of bemcentinib with pembrolizumab (Keytruda®) and doublet chemotherapy in first-line (1L) NSCLC patients enrolled in the Phase 1b portion of the study.
- Patients with STK11m NSCLC have a significantly poorer response to current therapies, including immune checkpoint inhibitors, when compared with patients with wild-type (non-mutated) STK11.
- There are currently no targeted therapies available for the STK11m NSCLC patient population, which represents up to 20% of 1L NSCLC patients.
- Martin Olin, Chief Executive Officer of BerGenBio added, "The high unmet medical need in 1L STK11m NSCLC patients is widely recognized.