Importance to health systems in many countries
Genentech’s Avastin cancer drug appears to treat age-related macular degeneration as safely as Genentech’s drug Lucentis, which is approved for that condition and costs significantly more, a new analysis says.
The findings, published Monday, are the latest to suggest that Avastin can be used off-label and safely for age-related macular degeneration, the leading cause of legal blindness in elderly populations of industrialized countries.
“This review addresses a question of immense importance to health systems in many countries,” said David Tovey, editor in chief of the Cochrane Library, where the study appeared, in a statement. “One of the many considerations in decision-making at policy level is not just understanding how effective treatments are, but also weighing up evidence of their safety.”
Researchers analyzed data from nine studies, including three unpublished ones, that involved 3,665 participants. They did not find a difference in safety among patients who took each drug in their first two years of treatment. In this case, the researchers judged safety on whether the medicines resulted in deaths or serious side effects that result in death, are life-threatening, require hospital admission or prolong hospital stay, or cause disability.