Sanofi's Elitek reduces PUA more than allopurinol

French drug major Sanofi-Aventis presented data from a Phase III study at the annual meeting of the American Society of Hematology in San Francisco showing that Elitek (rasburicase) significantly reduced plasma uric acid levels in patients with hematological malignancies at risk for tumor lysis syndrome compared to allopurinol, the current US standard treatment (p=0.0012).

The study also compared a sequential combination of the two agents (Elitek for three days followed by allopurinol for three, with one day overlap) versus allopurinol alone, which showed a reduction in plasma uric acid levels for the sequential combination versus allopurinol alone (p=0.06).

Tumor lysis syndrome is a potentially life-threatening metabolic complication that can result either spontaneously or following treatment of certain types of rapid-growing cancers, particularly leukemia or lymphoma. The syndrome develops when a particularly large volume of cells associated with fast growing tumors are destroyed, releasing cellular by-products like uric acid into the blood system faster than can be eliminated.