Pacific Edge Announces Successful Completion of Colorectal Cancer Prognostic Clinical Trial

CHICAGO--(EON: Enhanced Online News)--Pacific Edge (PEB), a New Zealand-based biomedical company, today announced the successful completion of the European clinical trial for their prognostic gene signature for colorectal cancer. The clinical trial results showed a successful outcome that enables patients diagnosed with UICC stage II or UICC stage III colorectal cancer and with a high risk of disease progression to be identified and treated more appropriately. PEB’s European licensee, Signature Diagnostics (SDX) completed the clinical trial and will present the results at the annual scientific meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology in Chicago on the 4^th of June.

“Our prognostic gene signature identifies patients with stage II or III colorectal cancer whose disease is aggressive, likely to recur after surgery, and who would benefit from additional therapy.”

Chief Executive Officer David Darling stated that the conclusion of the European clinical trial was a significant commercial milestone for Pacific Edge. “This prognostic gene signature for colorectal cancer is our second commercial product, and joins our bladder cancer diagnostic assay, Cxbladder™. Cxbladder™ is a fast, non-invasive assay that measures the activity of five genes from a small sample of the patient’s urine to accurately diagnose bladder cancer.”

Pacific Edge Chief Scientific Officer Parry Guilford commented that the company’s prognostic gene signature will meet a large unmet clinical need for patients diagnosed with stage II and stage III colorectal cancer. “Our prognostic gene signature identifies patients with stage II or III colorectal cancer whose disease is aggressive, likely to recur after surgery, and who would benefit from additional therapy.”

Pacific Edge granted a European exclusive licence for its new cutting-edge prognostic gene signature for colorectal cancer to SDX in late 2006 with commercialisation pending a successful completion of the clinical trial. Europe is the second largest healthcare market in the world after the United States and represents around 30 per cent of global health care spending.

Colorectal cancer has the second highest incidence of all cancers in the world, with over 1.1 million new cases diagnosed annually. It has a particularly high incidence in Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Europe and North America. This year more than 530,000 people around the world are expected to die from the disease.

About Pacific Edge

Pacific Edge specialises in the development and commercialisation of diagnostics and prognostics for cancer. It is actively researching and developing new products for gastric cancer, endometrial cancer and melanoma. For more information, please visit our websites at http://www.peblnz.com and http://www.cxbladder.com