Treatments for cancer have advanced a lot in recent years, but many still rely on the use of chemotherapy to either shrink tumors before surgery or help remove cancerous cells the surgery missed. The chemo can be very effective, but it’s also very toxic. Angiocrine Bioscience Inc. is developing a way to reduce those toxic side effects, and they just got a nice vote of confidence for that approach.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted Angiocrine Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy (RMAT) designation for their product AB-205.

RMAT is a big deal. It means the therapy, in this case AB-205, has already shown it is safe and potentially beneficial to patients, so the designation means that if it continues to be safe and effective it may be eligible for a faster, more streamlined approval process. And that means it can get to the patients who need it, outside of a clinical trial, faster.

What is AB-205? Well it’s made from genetically engineered cells, derived from cord blood, designed to help alleviate or accelerate recovery from the toxic side effects of chemotherapy for people undergoing treatment for lymphoma and other aggressive cancers of the blood or lymph system.

CIRM awarded Angiocrine Bioscience $6.2 million in 2018 to help carry out the Phase 2 clinical trial testing the therapy. In a news release ,CIRM President & CEO, Dr. Maria Millan, said there is a real need for this kind of therapy.

“This is a project that CIRM has supported from an earlier stage of research, highlighting our commitment to moving the most promising research out of the lab and into people. Lymphoma is the most common blood cancer and the 6th most commonly diagnosed cancer in California. Despite advances in therapy many patients still suffer severe complications from the chemotherapy, so any treatment that can reduce those complications can not only improve quality of life but also, we hope, improve long term health outcomes for patients.”

In a news release Dr. Paul Finnegan, Angiocrine’s CEO, welcomed the news.

“The RMAT designation speaks to the clinical meaningfulness and the promising efficacy data and safety profile of AB-205 based on our Phase 1b/2 study. This is an important step in accelerating the development of AB-205 towards its first market approval. We appreciate the thorough assessment provided by the FDA reviewers and the support from our partner, the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine.” 

The investment in Angiocrine marked a milestone for CIRM. It was the 50^th clinical trial we had funded. It was a cause for celebration then. We’re hoping it will be a cause for an even bigger celebration in the not too distant future.

The company hopes to start a Phase 3 clinical trial in the US and Europe next year.