A clinical trial to break new ground in sarcoma treatment

This project was selected in the framework of our European call: FIGHT KIDS CANCER 2021. It is jointly financed by Imagine for Margo, Kriibskrank Kanner Fondatioun and KickCancer.

It is thanks to your participation in RUN TO KICK 2021 that this innovative project is funded!

Click here to watch Dr. Pablo Berlanga explain this innovative FIGHT KIDS CANCER project.

Ewing's sarcoma is a malignant solid tumour that most often affects young patients (80% of patients are under 20 years old).

Like most paediatric cancers, Ewing’s sarcoma is a rare disease. In Europe, around 600 children and young adults are diagnosed every year.

The standard treatment for Ewing's sarcoma includes chemotherapy and local treatment with radiotherapy or surgery when possible. Despite this heavy treatment, the chances of survival for these young patients, when their disease is metastatic at diagnosis, amount to 30% only and half of the relapses occur already while in treatment. Over the last decades, no new effective drugs have been introduced in the frontline treatment. It is high-time we try to improve the chances of survival for those patients.

The "INTER-EWING-1" clinical trial is open to patients with metastatic Ewing's sarcoma. In most cases, innovative treatment is only offered when standard treatment fails. Here, as standard treatment offers only a limited efficacy, the clinical trial will be offered to patients immediately upon diagnosis.

This trial will study whether adding a new agent called “regorafenib” improves the effectiveness of the standard chemotherapy. It is a drug from the class of enzyme inhibitors; enzymes play a role in many cellular functions, such as cell growth or division. Here, regorafenib will inhibit the multi-targeted tyrosine kinase (TKI).

By inhibiting this enzyme, we are hoping to block the growth of cancer cells. Early clinical data suggest that strategies using multi-targeted TKIs would be among the most effective and could improve treatment in these young patients.

Fight Kids Cancer will allow the funding of the preliminary phase of this trial, with the aim to evaluate the safety of the combination of this drug with chemotherapy and its optimal dosage. The trial will be opened in 15 centres across 5 European countries.

In addition, the "INTER-EWING-1" project plans to evaluate two other questions aimed at improving standard treatments: the adaptation of radiotherapy doses and the addition of a so-called "maintenance" treatment. These additional issues will be funded through other calls for projects.

This clinical study will be available in our neighboring countries. KickCancer is committed to financing the travel costs for all children treated in Belgium if they wish to join the study.