Docetaxel Approved In First Market

Rhone-Poulenc Rorer's taxoid compound Taxotere (docetaxel) has been approved in its first market, Mexico, for the treatment of untreated and previously-treated breast and non-small cell lung cancer. The company intends to launch the drug in Mexico by April, 1995. Taxotere is the second taxoid to reach the market after Bristol-Myers Squibb's Taxol (paclitaxel), which was first launched in the USA for ovarian cancer in 1993.

Taxotere is suitable for use on an outpatient basis, notes R-PR, with the recommended dose in the Mexican application being 100mg/m2 given intravenously for one hour every three weeks. Like Taxol, Taxotere requires a premedication regimen to reduce some of the side effects of the drug which are thought to arise from the medium in which it is suspended.

Applications for approval of Taxotere are pending with regulatory authorities around the world, notes R-PR, and the US Food and Drug Administration's Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee will be reviewing the agent at its meeting tomorrow (December 13).