OSLO, Norway, Sept. 27, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Photocure ASA (OSE: PHO), the Bladder Cancer Company, announces that it entered into an agreement with Equity Pharmaceuticals PTY Limited, part of the Clinigen group, in September, to initiate a Named Patient Program (NPP) enabling bladder cancer patients in South Africa to receive blue light cystoscopy (BLC®) with Hexvix®.
Named Patient Programs (NPPs) provide access to medicines in response to requests by physicians on behalf of specific, or 'named,' patients when those medicines are not licensed or available in the patients' home country. Photocure's NPP with Equity Pharmaceuticals is designed to ensure that physicians can request Hexvix on behalf of individual patients residing in South Africa, with suspected or recurring bladder tumors. Hexvix blue light cystoscopy is indicated as adjunct to standard white light cystoscopy to contribute to the diagnosis and management of bladder cancer in patients with known or high suspicion of bladder cancer.
Equity Pharmaceuticals will administer the NPP, and product sales are anticipated to begin in Q4 2024.
"Without this NPP, BLC with Hexvix would not otherwise be available to bladder cancer patients in South Africa. Photocure is committed to ensuring global access to Hexvix as part of its sustainability goals," said Dan Schneider, President and CEO of Photocure. "We see this program as a stepstone to trialing various ways in which Hexvix can be made available to patients and urologists in countries where BLC equipment is already accessible."
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About Bladder Cancer
Bladder cancer ranks as the 8th most common cancer worldwide – the 5th most common in men – with 1,949,000 prevalent cases (5-year prevalence rate)1a, 6,14,000 new cases and more than 2,20,000 deaths in 2022.1b
Approx. 75% of all bladder cancer cases occur in men.1 It has a high recurrence rate with up to 61% in year one and up to 78% over five years.2 Bladder cancer has the highest lifetime treatment costs per patient of all cancers.3
Bladder cancer is a costly, potentially progressive disease for which patients have to undergo multiple cystoscopies due to the high risk of recurrence. There is an urgent need to improve both the diagnosis and the management of bladder cancer for the benefit of patients and healthcare systems alike.
Bladder cancer is classified into two types, non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) and muscle-invasive bladder cancer (MIBC), depending on the depth of invasion in the bladder wall. NMIBC remains in the inner layer of cells lining the bladder. These cancers are the most common (75%) of all BC cases and include the subtypes Ta, carcinoma in situ (CIS) and T1 lesions. In MIBC the cancer has grown into deeper layers of the bladder wall. These cancers, including subtypes T2, T3 and T4, are more likely to spread and are harder to treat.4