Adnkronos Rome, November 17 (Adnkronos Salute) – "Flt3-Itd acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a high-impact disease. Celebrating new milestones in innovation, discussing improved prognosis and reduced relapses in such serious diseases is heartwarming. In my opinion, however, a change of pace is needed in the care of patients, especially the elderly."
This is Davide Petruzzelli, president of the association "La lampada di Aladino Ets," commenting on the Italian Medicines Agency's (AIFA) recent approval for the reimbursement of quizartinib, the first drug launched in Italy by Daiichi Sankyo in hematology. It represents a new therapeutic option for newly diagnosed Flt3-Itd-positive AML, an aggressive form associated with a higher risk of relapse and a poor prognosis.
The approval was based on results from the phase 3 Quantum-First study, published in The Lancet, which demonstrated that the addition of quizartinib to standard high-dose chemotherapy, with or without allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation for consolidation, followed by maintenance monotherapy for up to approximately 3 years, significantly improved overall survival and reduced the risk of mortality by 22% compared to standard chemotherapy.
"The goal," Petruzzelli emphasizes, "is to live a quality life. I think it's an achievable goal, also thanks to psychological support, an aspect already operationally regulated but which, in practice, is not yet enforceable. It is therefore necessary to take action to implement what we have written everywhere, from the oncology plan onward." Indeed, "the National Network for Rare Tumors (RNTR), approved by the State-Regions Conference, exists, but with very few exceptions, it has not yet been implemented." The RNTR "defines hub and spoke centers, defining who can treat what and how," he clarifies, "and also describes how patients can access the network. On paper, we have everything; in practice, what has been identified as patients' needs remains to be implemented." These aspects demonstrate the need to "move to a higher institutionalized network," he concludes, "which would make access to services more uniform."