Dr Shapiro discusses the novel drug combination, when given sequentially, sapacitabine and seliciclib and their elicit antitumour effects in patients with incurable BRCA-deficient cancers during a press conference at the 2013 AACR Annual Meeting.

The phase I study was designed to exploit preclinical results that suggested that sapacitabine and seliciclib worked together synergistically. Sapacitabine is an oral nucleoside analogue that induces single-strand damage to DNA. If the damaged DNA is not repaired, it ultimately results in cell death. Repair of sapacitabine-induced DNA damage requires BRCA proteins, suggesting that BRCA-deficient cancers may be particularly sensitive.