Helsinn Healthcare SA, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center Enter Strategic Alliance to Improve Life of Patients Conducting Clinical Studies in Cancer Supportive and Palliative Care

LUGANO, Switzerland and HOUSTON, April 26, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

- Collaboration Plans a Comprehensive Range of Clinical Studies to Evaluate Helsinn Commercialized and/or Under Development Pipeline Products in Cancer Supportive Care and Palliative Settings 

- MD Anderson to Provide Clinical Expertise and Oncology Network.  

Helsinn, the Swiss pharmaceutical Group focused on building quality cancer care, and The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center today announce that they signed a strategic alliance on a broad, multi-year programme of clinical studies in cancer supportive and palliative care.

Under the terms of the collaboration agreement, MD Anderson, one of the world's most comprehensive and prestigious cancer hospital networks, will conduct 14 studies into Helsinn programmes with enrollment projects of 420 patients. The collaboration aims to investigate new uses and better outcomes for these programmes for people with cancer in the supportive and palliative settings. This relationship will leverage MD Anderson's significant clinical expertise and access to world recognized key opinion leaders, providing Helsinn with an unparalleled network or oncology specialists.

The collaboration will focus on six major disease areas; fatigue, anorexia/cachexia, diarrhea chronic nausea, pruritus and chemotherapy-induced neuropathic pain in a five-year time frame.

Riccardo Braglia, Helsinn Group Vice Chairman and CEO, commented: "MD Anderson is among the world's most prestigious cancer hospital networks with an unparalleled clinical capability. At Helsinn, we are committed to finding ways to offer people with cancer the best possible quality of life. We believe that this collaboration will allow us to explore new outcomes for our existing commercialized products and to explore alternative uses for our pipeline programmes to maximise our chances of being able to offer new, innovative solutions to people with cancer."

"There is a great opportunity to develop new and effective drugs to treat the main symptoms caused by cancer, such as weight loss, fatigue, nausea, pain, pruritus, diarrhea, and anorexia/cachexia," said Eduardo Bruera, M.D., chair of Palliative, Rehabilitation & Integrative Medicine at MD Anderson. "There is also a great opportunity to develop drugs to treat the side effects of emerging and highly effective new targeted and immunological treatments for cancer patients".

Notes for editors: 

About Helsinn Group 

Helsinn is a privately owned cancer supportive care pharmaceutical group with an extensive portfolio of marketed products and a broad development pipeline. Since 1976, Helsinn has been improving the everyday lives of patients, guided by core family values of respect, integrity and quality, through a unique integrated licensing business model working with long standing partners in pharmaceuticals, medical devices and nutritional supplement products. Helsinn is headquartered in Lugano, Switzerland, with operating subsidiaries in Ireland and the US, a representative office in China, as well as a product presence in about 90 countries globally.

In 2016, our 40^th anniversary year, you can meet representatives from Helsinn at:

• ASCO Annual Meeting (Chicago, USA, 3-7 June)
• MASCC Annual Meeting (Adelaide, Australia, 23-25 June)
• ChemOutsourcing Conference (Parsippany, New Jersey, 19-21 September)
• CPhI Worldwide (Barcelona, Spain, 4-6 October)
• ESMO Congress (Copenhagen, Denmark, 7-11 October)
• BioEurope (Köln, Germany, 4-6 November)

For more information, please visit www.helsinn.com

About MD Anderson 

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston ranks as one of the world's most respected centers focused on cancer patient care, research, education and prevention. The institution's sole mission is to end cancer for patients and their families around the world. MD Anderson is one of only 45 comprehensive cancer centers designated by the National Cancer Institute (NCI). MD Anderson is ranked No.1 for cancer care in U.S. News & World Report's "Best Hospitals" survey. It has ranked as one of the nation's top two hospitals since the survey began in 1990, and has ranked first for 11 of the past 14 years. MD Anderson receives a cancer center support grant from the NCI of the National Institutes of Health (P30 CA016672).

For more information, please contact:
Helsinn Group
Paola Bonvicini
Head of Communication & Press Office
Tel: +41 91-985-21-21
Info-hhc@helsinn.com

MD Anderson
Ron Gilmore
Tel: 713-795-1898
Rlgilmore1@mdanderson.org