Montreal doctor at forefront of promising Cancer Drug study

One such promising advance, is that a new drug cocktail therapy used experimentally sent the first few patients, about 40 in total located in Quebec, United States, England and British Columbia, who tried it into “complete remission,” Saad says. “So we’re very excited about this response.”
Lead investigator Saad and his team at the Centre hospitalier de l’Université de Montréal Research Centre (CRCHUM) are now testing this drug in several centres worldwide. The drug is not yet approved for patient use, and goes by its developmental code name ARN-509 and JNJ-56021927.
The drug blocks genes that affect prostate cancer cell growth. It’s combined with anti-androgen drug Zytiga (abiraterone acetate), which stops the production of the hormone testosterone that feeds prostate cancer cells. Zytiga was approved three years ago, and is usually prescribed alone — the go-to treatment for aggressive prostate cancer. But when that fails, patients with advanced cancer die within 18 months on average.
“This is one of the first combination treatments of two drugs rather than one, and it attacks the cancer in a complementary fashion,” said Saad, who last year recruited several patients locally to participate in the initial clinical trial for safety.