Bone drug has benefits in cancer patients

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - The bone-strengthening drug zoledronic acid not only reduces fracture risk in patients with cancer that has spread to the bones, it also improves overall survival, according to the results of a retrospective analysis of three large studies. Bones are common sites for the spread, or metastasis, of cancer. Zoledronic acid decreases bone turnover and reduces bone fractures in patients with the bone-thinning disease osteoporosis. Dr. Allan Lipton of Milton S. Hershey Medical Center at Pennsylvania State University and colleagues took a look back at 578 patients with bone metastases from breast cancer, 472 patients with hormone-refractory prostate cancer and 291 patients with non-small cell lung cancer and other solid tumors, who were given either zoledronic acid or control therapy. Control therapy was the bone drug pamidronate in breast cancer patients and placebo in prostate and lung cancer patients. Treatment was given for up to 2 years. They found that most patients with initially normal levels NTx -- a marker of bone loss that is secreted in urine -- maintained normal levels while taking zoledronic acid. Most patients with elevated NTx levels at the outset, suggesting increased bone loss, saw their NTx levels normalize with zoledronic acid. Normalization of NTx levels occurred with zoledronic acid in 81 percent of breast cancer patients, in 70 percent of prostate cancer patients and in 81 percent of lung cancer patients with initially high NTx levels. NTx levels normalized with pamidronate "control" therapy in 65 percent of breast cancer patients, while 8 percent and 17 percent of the prostate and lung cancer patients, respectively, saw their NTx levels normalize on placebo. Of note, the study showed improved overall survival in patients got their NTx levels into the normal range compared to those with persistently elevated NTx levels, Lipton and colleagues report.