Today’s approval of Abiraterone (Zytiga) in the European Union (EU) offers a new treatment option for more than 70,000 patients living with prostate cancer in European member states. Prostate cancer is the third most common cause of cancer deaths in the EU.

Zytiga (marketed by Johnson & Johnson) is a once-daily oral medication that provides patients who have exhausted other treatment options, including chemotherapy, a new option. Abiraterone was approved for patient use in the United States by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in April of this year.

PCF funded more than $8 million for early research that helped answer leading questions about the drug including how it works and its role in advanced metastatic prostate cancer. The Foundation also helped speed clinical trials through its Prostate Cancer Clinical Trials Consortium, enrolling more men into abiraterone trials faster than any previous prostate cancer drug study. PCF is supporting continuing research to assess in which patients Zytiga is most effective, potential benefits to patients if the drug is deployed earlier in the disease process, as wells as what other drugs Zytiga might be combined with to further improve patient outcomes.