Pegloprastide (AVB-620) is based on the science of activatable cell-penetrating peptides and is designed to deliver a fluorescent marker specifically to cancer cells to enable surgeons to identify cancerous tissue in real-time and thus, avoid repeat surgeries and improve patient outcomes. Pegloprastide is the only fluorescence-based clinical cancer detection product that uses the ratio of two fluorophores within the same molecule (ratiometric imaging) to provide more accurate and actionable information during a procedure.
Pegloprastide is currently an investigational product under development in human clinical trials. A recent Phase 2 registration study of the use of pegloprastide during breast cancer surgery met its primary endpoint of detecting cancer in margin specimens in real time (p < 0.001).
Additional top-line data analysis found:
- Use of pegloprastide during surgery correctly identified cancer in up to 75% of patients who may have otherwise been candidates for a repeat (re-excision) surgery
- Overall accuracy of pegloprastide in detecting true positive or true negative patients was ~81%
- While the current typical re-excision rate among initial lumpectomies is estimated at 20-40%, the observed re-excision rate in this prospective study was ~6%
In clinical studies, pegloprastide has been administered by intravenous (IV) injection between ~3-20 hours prior to surgery. In more than 150 patients dosed to date, no drug-related serious adverse events have been reported.
Given the potential broad applicability of pegloprastide due to its MMP-driven mechanism of action, Avelas plans to explore the use of pegloprastide to improve outcomes in a variety of other non-breast cancer surgeries, such as ovarian, colorectal, head and neck, melanoma, and sarcoma.
For more information on pegloprastide’s clinical experience, please visit our Clinical Trials page.
