The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently approved ruxolitinib, the first drug for patients with acute graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) who have an inadequate response to steroid treatment. Madan Jagasia, MBBS, MS, MMHC, chief medical officer and co-leader of the Translational Research and Interventional Oncology Program at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC), was a lead investigator of the REACH1 trial that was the basis for the FDA approval.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery year in the United States, about half of the people who develop acute GVHD do not respond adequately to steroids, making it an extremely challenging disease to treat,\u201d said Jagasia, holder of the Beverly and George Rawlings Directorship, and professor of Medicine at Vanderbilt. \u201cWhile allogeneic stem cell transplants have the potential to transform people\u2019s lives, the onset of GVHD can significantly impact their prognosis. Ruxolitinib is now a new treatment option for acute GVHD patients who do not respond to corticosteroids who, until now, have had limited choices.\u201d The overall response rate after 28 days of treatment was 54.9%. The recommended starting dose of ruxolitinib for GVHD is 5 mg twice daily. Incyte Corporation, which applied for the FDA approval, will market the drug under the brand name Jakafi.<\/p>\n
GVHD occurs when donor immune (T cells) begin attacking the recipient\u2019s healthy tissue after an allogeneic stem cell transplant. There are two types of GVHD \u2014 acute and chronic. The FDA approval of ruxolitinib is for the acute form of the disease in patients who have not responded to corticosteroids.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis would not have been possible without the support of our amazing clinical trials team, our incredible physicians, mid-level providers and nurses who take care of these complex patients,\u201d Jagasia said. \u201cLast, but not least, we cannot thank our patients enough who are not only fighting these tough diseases but by their participation in studies, help others.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently approved ruxolitinib, the first drug for patients with acute graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) who have an inadequate response to steroid treatment. Madan Jagasia, MBBS, MS, MMHC, chief medical officer and co-leader of the Translational Research and Interventional Oncology Program at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC), was a lead investigator…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":212,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[11,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-vm-around-the-medical-center","category-fall-2019"],"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcDnub-yT","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/212"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2163"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2163\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2951,"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2163\/revisions\/2951"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medschool.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbilt-medicine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}