#GiveMenMoreTime

Two targeted therapies (Olaparib and Pluvicto) have been developed for the treatment of men with advanced prostate cancer. Both extend life and offer a better quality of life with milder side effects of treatment.  

These “precision” treatments specifically target and destroy cancer cells, wherever they are in the patient’s body, unlike chemotherapy that can cause damage to healthy cells. Both offer a better quality of life with milder side effects of treatment than chemotherapy. Both could be prescribed for men who are not suitable for chemotherapy.  

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) makes a decision about whether or not NHS access to new treatments should be granted in England and Wales. Neither Olaparib nor Pluvicto have been recommended so far, and a final decision on Pluvicto is expected in January 2023. 

Every day, 33 men in the UK lose their lives to prostate cancer. These new drugs could make all the difference, giving quality time back to these men and their families. 

1. Write a letter or email to your MP 

Please join our campaign to highlight the human cost of failures in NHS access to precision medicines for prostate cancer by writing to your MP. 

By writing to your MP, you can help to raise awareness of prostate cancer and highlight the unfairness of the situation.  Your politician can raise the issue in the House of Commons or write to a government minister.  

When writing to your MP don’t forget to: 

• Use the paragraphs above to set out the problem 
• Say who you are and where you live 
• Give your contact details 
• Say why access to precision medicines for prostate cancer matters to you 

• Say what you would like your parliamentarian to do (this might be to raise the matter in the House of Commons or write to the Secretary of State for Health to highlight the matter). 
• Email us at [email protected] to let us know you have written to your MP. We can then follow up with their office to encourage them to act.  
• You can also copy the email or letter to us if you are comfortable in doing so. 
• Let us know if you receive a response and share a copy of the response with us. 

To find out who your MP is and what their postal/email address is please visit the following website and enter your postcode:  

https://members.parliament.uk/FindYourMP 

2. Share your action on social media 

Post on your social media that you have written to your MP and encourage others to do the same. Share this information with them so they can be armed with the information they need. 

Use #GiveMenMoreTime when talking about the action you’ve taken and to keep up to date with campaign news on Twitter and Facebook. 

• Olaparib (Lynparza, AstraZeneca) is licenced for the treatment of metastatic prostate cancer in patients with BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations whose cancer has progressed after hormone treatment. 1 in 400 people in the UK have the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene mutations, both of which are associated with an increased risk of developing prostate cancer.  Around 8% of patients with prostate cancer carry a BRCA mutation.   

• Cells with a change in BRCA genes rely on a protein called PARP to repair damage in DNA. Olaparib inhibits this protein, and because the cancer cells cannot then repair DNA damage, they die.  

• Olaparib became the world’s first genetically targeted cancer drug in 2014 when it was approved for women with ovarian cancer who had inherited BRCA mutation. It is available on the NHS for patients with ovarian, fallopian and primary peritoneal cancer. In March 2021 NICE blocked access to this drug for men with prostate cancer. Olaparib has been approved by the Scottish Medicines Consortium and is therefore available on the NHS in Scotland for men with advanced prostate cancer. 

• In a clinical trial, patients taking Olaparib lived without their cancer getting any bigger for an average of 7.4 months, in comparison to 3.6 months for those taking existing treatments, in this case either abiraterone or enzalutamide.  

• Pluvicto (Lu 177, AAA Novartis) is a targeted medicine that latches onto prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA), which is found in 80 to 90% of prostate cancers.  Pluvicto is a “radioligand” therapy, a type of treatment in which radioactive materials are attached to drugs which are attracted to and stick to certain proteins found on tumour cells. This makes radiotherapy better at hunting down cancer cells, and less likely to harm normal, healthy cells in the body. In clinical trial, Pluvicto extended life by around five months in terminal cases. 

• Pluvicto is suitable for patients with prostate specific membrane antigen (PMSA)-positive metastatic castration resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) who have been treated with androgen receptor (AR) pathway inhibition and taxane-based chemotherapy. It can also be used to treat patients who are not suitable for chemotherapy. 

• Treatment with Pluvicto can improve a patient’s quality of life, reduce the risk of death and reduce the risk of progression. Patients receiving this new treatment have reported that, in contrast to chemotherapy, it had little or no negative impact on their quality of life. In the Phase 3 VISION clinical trial, Pluvicto was found to extend life by around 5 months in terminal cases.