Evgen in breast cancer breakthrough?

LIVERPOOL-based Evgen Pharma, working with researchers from the University of Manchester, has developed a new combination of drugs which could overcome treatment resistance and relapse in breast cancer.
 
At the American Association of Cancer Research annual conference, it was revealed that for the most common type of breast cancer, affecting 70% of patients, the Evgen drug Sulforadex helps overcome resistance to routinely used hormonal treatments by targeting the cancer stem cell population.
 
The new combination therapy, combines Evgen’s Wnt pathway-suppressing drug, Sulforadex with standard hormonal treatments.  This targets both the estrogen-sensitive cells and the remaining cancer stem cells at the same time.
 
Evgen Pharma, which is headquartered in Liverpool Science Park has received more than £1.7m funding from The North West Fund for Biomedical, managed by SPARK Impact.

Dr Marc d’Abbadie, investment director at SPARK impact, said: “We are delighted to see Evgen’s continued technical progress in such a crucial area. This new combination of drugs has the potential to help thousands of women whose breast cancer is resistant to standard treatment.”
 
Dr David Howat, head of research and development at Evgen Pharma said: “We are really excited about the data presented at the AACR.

“Dr Rob Clarke and his excellent research team at the University’s Institute of Cancer Sciences have demonstrated the efficacy of Sulforadex in patient derived cancer tissues in vitro and, importantly, in an in vivo setting.

“We now intend to extend this collaboration and advance Sulforadex into a clinical trial with breast cancer patients.”
 
It recently postponed plans to list on the AIM market after would-be investors asked for more research data on its pipeline of treatments.