The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 277 No 7431 p727
16 December 2006

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Cancer patients with anaemia

Cancer patients with anaemia, whether or not caused by chemotherapy, benefit from erythropoietin treatment. In a study, presented at a meeting of the American Society of Hematology in Florida earlier this week, patients not receiving chemotherapy were treated with darbepoetin alfa (n=162) or placebo (n=56) for up to 17 weeks. A haematopoietic response was achieved in 69 per cent of treated patients, compared with 24 per cent of patients given placebo (P<0.0001). In addition, 85 per cent of the treated patients reached a haemoglobin target of >11g/dL compared with 50 per cent of placebo patients (P<0.001).