Survival Rate

The reason that the survival rate for mesothelioma cancer is so low is that the common age for patients is 50 to 70 years old. Many of these patients are suffering, or dying, from more than one disease.

An experimental anti-cancer drug, pemetrexed, is continuing to show increasing promise for patients with malignant mesothelioma.

Tests combined pemetrexed (Alimta) with the established chemotherapy drug carboplatin and it increased the average survival rate from eight to nine months to fifteen months. One third of the patients studied were alive when the report was prepared – three years later. Two thirds of the patients saw tumors shrink, and a noticeable level of pain relief.

"This drug combination showed remarkable activity in mesothelioma," said the trial study author, professor Hilary Calvert of the Cancer Research Unit at Newcastle University, in Newcastle-Upon-Tyne in England. "The number of patients in this study and the well-tolerated nature of the pemetrexed plus carboplatin combination are going to make this a very popular therapy very quickly when pemetrexed gets out on the market," said Vogelzang.

This is not the only therapy that has seen the average doubled, but it is currently the only treatment for advanced cases that previously offered patients no hope, which is good news for the future of the disease.