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Columbia University Medical Center NewsroomCUMC Expert Resources
|  Robert Fine, M.D. ,
The survival rate for pancreatic cancer is exceptionally poor—an abysmal 4 percent—compared to other types of cancer, largely because it isn't usually caught or diagnosed until a very late stage of development. Statistics appear to bear this out: According to a 2004 report by the National Cancer Institute, pancreatic cancer is the fourth and fifth leading cause of cancer-related fatalities among U.S. men and women, respectively.Dr. Robert Fine, associate professor of medicine at Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons, director of experimental therapeutics at Columbia's Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center, and head of the Pancreas Center at Columbia, is single-handedly giving pancreatic cancer patients new reason to hope. In a recent phase II clinical trial, Dr. Fine devised a complex chemotherapy regimen called GTX—combining the cancer drugs Gemzar, Taxotere, and Xeloda—that succeeded in increasing median survival time from 4.5 months to 11.2 months, the single longest survival rate ever reported for metastatic pancreatic cancer. If these exciting results hold up in Phase III trials, it will be the new standard of care for this disease. A noted authority on the use of experimental therapeutics for drug-resistant cancers, Dr. Fine can talk about why this particular drug combination and routine works so well in comparison to others, and can discuss what's next on the horizon for pancreatic cancer treatment.
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