Shark Cartilage in Treating Patients With Advanced Colorectal or Breast Cancer

July 12, 2016 updated by: Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology

Phase III Evaluation Of Benefin Shark Cartilage In Patients With Advanced Cancer

RATIONALE: Shark cartilage extract may help shrink or slow the growth of colorectal cancer or breast cancer cells.

PURPOSE: Randomized phase III trial to determine the effectiveness of shark cartilage in treating patients who have advanced colorectal cancer or advanced breast cancer.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

OBJECTIVES:

  • Determine whether the addition of powdered shark cartilage (BeneFin™) to standard therapy improves overall survival in patients with advanced colorectal or breast cancer.
  • Determine whether this therapy has any impact on toxicity in these patients.
  • Determine whether this therapy improves the quality of life in these patients.

OUTLINE: This is a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, multicenter study. Patients are stratified according to disease type (breast vs colorectal female vs colorectal male), age (49 and under vs 50-69 vs 70 and over), ECOG performance status (0-1 vs 2), baseline quality of life (UNISCALE rating less than 50% vs 50-75% vs more than 75%), and concurrent chemotherapy (yes vs no). Patients are randomized to 1 of 2 treatment arms.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

88

Phase

  • Phase 3

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

  • United States
    • Arizona
      • Scottsdale, Arizona, United States, 85259-5404
        • CCOP - Scottsdale Oncology Program
    • Florida
      • Jacksonville, Florida, United States, 32224
        • Mayo Clinic
    • Illinois
      • Peoria, Illinois, United States, 61602
        • CCOP - Illinois Oncology Research Association
      • Urbana, Illinois, United States, 61801
        • CCOP - Carle Cancer Center
    • Iowa
      • Cedar Rapids, Iowa, United States, 52403-1206
        • CCOP - Cedar Rapids Oncology Project
      • Des Moines, Iowa, United States, 50309-1016
        • CCOP - Iowa Oncology Research Association
      • Sioux City, Iowa, United States, 51101-1733
        • Siouxland Hematology-Oncology
    • Kansas
      • Wichita, Kansas, United States, 67214-3882
        • CCOP - Wichita
    • Minnesota
      • Duluth, Minnesota, United States, 55805
        • CCOP - Duluth
      • Saint Cloud, Minnesota, United States, 56303
        • CentraCare Health Plaza
    • Nebraska
      • Omaha, Nebraska, United States, 68106
        • CCOP - Missouri Valley Cancer Consortium
    • North Dakota
      • Bismarck, North Dakota, United States, 58501
        • Medcenter One Health System
      • Fargo, North Dakota, United States, 58122
        • CCOP - Merit Care Hospital
    • Ohio
      • Toledo, Ohio, United States, 43623-3456
        • CCOP - Toledo Community Hospital
    • South Dakota
      • Rapid City, South Dakota, United States, 57709
        • Rapid City Regional Hospital
      • Sioux Falls, South Dakota, United States, 57104
        • CCOP - Sioux Community Cancer Consortium

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

DISEASE CHARACTERISTICS:

  • Breast or colorectal primary tumor sites

    • Considered incurable
  • Breast cancer patients must have disease progression after at least 2 different chemotherapy regimens (may include chemotherapy given as an adjuvant treatment)

PATIENT CHARACTERISTICS:

Age:

  • 18 and over

Sex:

  • Male or female

Performance status:

  • ECOG 0-2

Life expectancy:

  • More than 3 months

Hepatic:

  • Bilirubin no greater than 3 times upper limit of normal (ULN)

Renal:

  • Calcium less than 1.2 times ULN

Other:

  • Not pregnant or nursing
  • Fertile patients must use effective contraception

PRIOR CONCURRENT THERAPY:

Chemotherapy:

  • Concurrent chemotherapy allowed
  • No concurrent participation in a cytotoxic chemotherapy clinical trial

Other:

  • At least 60 days since prior shark cartilage

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Treatment
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Double

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: BeneFin

Patients receive oral shark cartilage (BeneFin™) 3-4 times daily. Treatment continues in the absence of unacceptable toxicity. Quality of life is assessed weekly for 1 month and then monthly thereafter during treatment.

Patients are followed every 6 months for 5 years.
Drug: BenFin
Other: placebo

Patients receive oral placebo 3-4 times daily. Treatment continues in the absence of unacceptable toxicity. Quality of life is assessed weekly for 1 month and then monthly thereafter during treatment.

Patients are followed every 6 months for 5 years.
Other: placebo

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Time Frame
overall survival
Time Frame: Up to 5 years
Up to 5 years

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Time Frame
quality of life
Time Frame: Up to 5 years
Up to 5 years

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology

Collaborators

National Cancer Institute (NCI)

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start

August 1, 2001

Primary Completion (Actual)

September 1, 2006

Study Completion (Actual)

September 1, 2006

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

November 9, 2001

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

January 26, 2003

First Posted (Estimate)

January 27, 2003

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Estimate)

July 13, 2016

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

July 12, 2016

Last Verified

July 1, 2016

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • NCCTG-971151
  • CDR0000068987 (Registry Identifier: PDQ (Physician Data Query))
  • NCCAM

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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