Everolimus for the treatment of advanced pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC)

ABSTRACT

Introduction: PDAC is a lethal malignancy with a clear unmet need; almost all patients fail 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd line multi-agent cytotoxic chemotherapy. The mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) has been identified as a key signaling node enhancing tumor survival and drug resistance in PDAC; hence, it is considered a promising therapeutic target.

Areas covered: We comprehensively reviewed the evidence from preclinical and phase I and II clinical trials, based on the authors’clinical experience and a PubMed, Cochrane library, Embase, and Google Scholar search everolimus + pancreatic cancer.

Expert opinion: Everolimus has not demonstrated efficacy in PDAC; however, an mTOR inhibitor in combination with stroma-targeted therapies may be a promising area to explore in clinical trials.

KEYWORDS:

• Everolimus
• pancreatic adenocarcinoma
• mTOR

Box 1. Drug Summary.

Table

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Dr James Mancuso for reviewing and editing the manuscript.

Declaration of interest

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

Reviewer disclosures

Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Additional information

Funding

The work of the authors is funded by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Cancer Institute Grant 2P30 CA023074.