Cancer treatment that saved teacher’s life approved by FDA
Reported December 18, 2007
A Canal Winchester woman has a very personal connection to a recently approved form of cancer therapy: It helped send her own cancer into remission.
Amy Baker, a Winchester resident and retired Gahanna teacher, has been undergoing treatment for chronic myeloid leukemia — or CML — with the new therapy Tasigna, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration just two months ago.
Baker, who was suffering from flu-like aches and pains, had her symptoms diagnosed as CML in December 2003.
“About the longest anyone lived with CML (at the time) was five years,” Baker said.
*
Dr. William G. Blum, oncologist with the Department of Hematology and Oncology at the Ohio State University’s James Cancer Hospital, treated Baker at the onset of her diagnosis with Gleevec.
“Gleevec is very highly effective, and three-quarters (who take it) will go into complete remission,” Blum said.
“Gleevec is called the ‘miracle drug,’ ” Baker said. “It was the first targeted drug therapy,” designed to target only cancer cells, she said.
“So you don’t lose your hair and nothing else is damaged.”
Baker did well on the treatment until 2005, when she and Blum discovered she had developed a resistance to it. Blum then suggested Baker participate in a clinical trial for the drug Tasigna.
Baker said she first flew to Chicago, where a trial was being held, but the study required she fly there every 28 days for treatment.
“I realized I don’t want to fly in and out of Chicago in the winter,” Baker said.
Her other options were Houston and Tampa, Fla.
Baker began her travels to the Moffitt Cancer Hospital in Tampa in 2005 and she underwent treatment in the study every 28 days for two and a half years — without any way of knowing if the treatment would work.
“I called it my leukemia adventure,” she said.
When Baker’s Tasigna treatment began in August 2005, 90 percent of her cells were filled with leukemia, she said. After 28 days on Tasigna, the occupation was down to 20 percent.
Now, none of Baker’s cells contain leukemia.
“I’ve been in major remission for over two years,” she said.
Despite being in remission, Baker must continue to take Tasigna. She takes a 400-milligram capsule twice each day.
“If you stop taking it, (the cancer) comes back for many, many people,” Baker said.
CML, one of the four most common types of leukemia, is caused by an abnormal signal among chromosomes, Baker said.
“The underlying theme to the therapy is trying to block that abnormal signal,” said Blum.
If Baker had not pursued the trial for Tasigna, Blum said, the risky procedure of a bone-marrow transplant could have been the next step.
“Once the disease progresses, it’s much more difficult to deal with,” he said.
Now that Tasigna has been approved by the FDA, Baker is able to get her prescription from a local pharmacy, and Blum will resume his role as her doctor.
Baker said the FDA approval brought “a great deal of joy for me and my family and friends.” She is glad the drug has been deemed safe and is particularly grateful she no longer has to travel to get her treatment, she said.
“The whole time, I was very thankful that I was able to be in the trial and thankful that it worked so well,” she said.
When Baker was first diagnosed in 2003, she did some research on CML.
In 2003, approximately 4,000 people were affected with CML, and 4,000 died each year, she said. Now, only 400 people die from the disease annually.
According to a statement from Novartis, the company responsible for Gleevec and Tasigna, Tasigna produced results in 40 percent of patients who did not respond to other treatment.
Baker, who said she feels wonderful and is expected to live a normal lifespan, is doing anything she wants now, including working out and trying to keep healthy and active.
“I guess I’ve always felt like we need to live each day the best we can,” she said. “I don’t sit around and worry about what the future’s going to be for me; I just do the best I can every day.”
Blum expects the best for Baker, he said.
“We hope that she’ll be on this drug for the rest of her life, and that she’ll never know the difference,” he said.