A new indication for Lipiodol Ultra Fluid (Guerbet) has been approved in Switzerland and in India for chemoembolization (cTACE) of tumours in adults with known intermediate-stage hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).
HCC is the most common primary liver cancer and is the 4th leading cause of annual cancer death worldwide.
“Guerbet is proud to have received approval for this new indication for Lipiodol Ultra Fluid. This is evidence of our commitment to making cTACE available to as many HCC patients as possible,” says Thomas Bonnefont, Guerbet’s vice president for Interventional Imaging. “Development of these image-guided procedures is a top priority for Guerbet’s interventional imaging franchise as we work to enhance liver cancer patients’ prognosis and quality of life worldwide.”
Lipiodol Ultra Fluid is used for cTACE, a minimally invasive procedure which consists of mixing Lipiodol Ultra Fluid with an anticancer drug, to treat patients with unresectable liver tumours. The mixture is injected trans-arterially in the liver as a loco-regional targeted chemotherapy for unresectable liver tumors (HCC). Lipiodol Ultra Fluid acts as a contrast agent, a drug-eluting vehicle, and a dual arterio-portal transient embolic.
cTACE indication is now approved in EMEA (Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Iran, Ireland, Luxemburg, The Netherlands, Portugal, Switzerland, Turkey), APAC (Cambodia, Hong Kong, India, Mongolia, New Zealand, Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam), and Latin America (Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Peru).
HCC imaging indication is now approved in Canada, Germany and in the USA.
cTACE has been recognised as the gold standard for the treatment of patients with intermediate-stage HCC by several international clinical consensuses. These consensus guidelines unanimously recommend cTACE as the standard-of-care for patients with intermediate-stage HCC. cTACE has strong recommendation and high leave of evidence for patients at BCLC stage B in European guidelines. Consequently, treatment with cTACE is constantly increasing on all continents, with more than 400,000 patients being treated every year, a Guerbet press release states.
