FDA Approves Talazoparib for Deleterious Germline BRCA-Mutated HER2-Negative Locally Advanced or Metastatic Breast Cancer
On October 16, 2018, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved talazoparib (Talzenna), a poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor, for patients with deleterious or suspected deleterious germline BRCA-mutated (gBRCAm), HER2-negative locally advanced or metastatic breast cancer. Patients must be selected for therapy based on an FDA-approved companion diagnostic for talazoparib.
Approval was based on the EMBRACA trial, an open-label trial that randomly selected 431 patients (2:1) with gBRCAm HER2-negative locally advanced or metastatic breast cancer to receive talazoparib (1 mg) or physician’s choice of chemotherapy (capecitabine, eribulin, gemcitabine, or vinorelbine). All patients were required to have a known deleterious or suspected deleterious gBRCA mutation and must have received no more than three prior cytotoxic chemotherapy regimens for locally advanced or metastatic disease. Patients were required to have received treatment with an anthracycline and/or a taxane (unless contraindicated) in the neoadjuvant, adjuvant, and/or metastatic treatment setting.
The primary efficacy outcome was progression-free survival (PFS) according to Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors (RECIST) 1.1, as assessed by blinded independent central review. Estimated median PFS was 8.6 and 5.6 months in the talazoparib and chemotherapy arms, respectively (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.54; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.41–0.71; P < .0001).
The prescribing information includes warnings and precautions for myelodysplastic syndrome/acute myeloid leukemia, myelosuppression, and embryo-fetal toxicity. Most common (≥ 20%) adverse reactions of any grade were fatigue, anemia, nausea, neutropenia, headache, thrombocytopenia, vomiting, alopecia, diarrhea, and decreased appetite.
The FDA also approved the BRACAnalysis CDx test (Myriad Genetic Laboratories, Inc) to identify patients with breast cancer with deleterious or suspected deleterious gBRCAm who are eligible for talazoparib. The effectiveness of the BRACAnalysis CDx test was based on the EMBRACA trial population for whom deleterious or suspected deleterious gBRCAm status was confirmed with either prospective or retrospective testing with BRACAnalysis CDx.
The recommended talazoparib dose is 1 mg taken as a single oral daily dose, with or without food.
The content in this post has not been reviewed by the American Society of Clinical Oncology, Inc. (ASCO®) and does not necessarily reflect the ideas and opinions of ASCO®.
