This paper discusses the need for better treatment options for patients suffering from astrocytoma and glioblastoma (GBM), the two most frequently diagnosed primary brain tumors. In addition, secondary brain cancers that originate from the metastatic spread of peripheral cancers, such as those of the lung, skin, breast, kidneys, and gastrointestinal tract are about 10-fold more prevalent than primary brain malignancies and account for about 200,000 cases diagnosed each year in the US.

The treatment for all brain-localized malignancies is generally based on surgery followed by radiation therapy with or without chemotherapy. Each of these approaches faces certain limitations. In the case of chemotherapy, a major obstacle is the blood-brain barrier (BBB). While many oral and intravenous anticancer agents are present in the systemic circulation at concentrations that are sufficient to effectively target peripheral disease, most often they are unable to cross the BBB and reach the brain-localized lesions at equally impactful concentrations.

NeOnc’s patented NEO100 has the potential to offer a better alternative to current therapeutic approaches for brain-based tumors. Intranasal (IN) delivery of anticancer agents holds the promise to provide a more effective route to deliver therapeutics to the intracranial tumor site. Rather than being impeded by the BBB, IN delivery seeks to circumvent this obstacle and minimize its interference by exploiting a pathway of direct nose-to-brain transport. 

NeOnc has completed its Phase 1 study and Phase 2a multi-site trials with recurrent grade IV glioma brain cancer patients is currently underway to gather data showing that NEO100 indeed reaches the intracranial tumor site after IN and to determine what impact it has on impeding tumor growth..

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Bringing intranasal drug delivery for malignancies in the
brain to market.

Authors: Thomas C. Chen^{1, 2, 3}, Axel H. Schönthal, PhD⁴, and Clovis O. da Fonseca⁵

¹Department of Neurosurgery, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA
²USC/Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, Los Angeles, CA, USA
³NeOnc Technologies, Inc. Westlake Village, California, USA
⁴Department of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA
⁵Department of Neurological Surgery, Federal Hospital of Ipanema, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil