Blaze Bioscience Announces Presentation Of Tumor Paint BLZ-100 Clinical Data At American Society of Breast Surgeons (ASBrS) Annual Meeting

SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Blaze Bioscience, Inc., the Tumor Paint Company^®, a biotechnology company dedicated to improving the lives of cancer patients, today announced that clinical data from the company’s Phase 1 study of Tumor Paint BLZ-100 (tozuleristide) in breast cancer patients will be presented at the 18^th Annual American Society of Breast Surgeons (ASBrS) Meeting being held April 26-30, 2017, in Las Vegas, Nevada.

“Real-time, near-infrared detection of breast cancer using BLZ-100 in patients undergoing surgical tumor resection”

The poster presentation, titled “Real-time, near-infrared detection of breast cancer using BLZ-100 in patients undergoing surgical tumor resection,” will be presented by Kristi Harrington, M.D., Ph.D., breast surgeon at Overlake Hospital Medical Center in Bellevue, WA, and a principal investigator of the study.

The study presented at ASBrS describes the Phase 1 experience in breast cancer patients with the investigational product BLZ-100 (tozuleristide), a peptide-fluorophore conjugate. This investigational agent has the potential to aid surgeons and pathologists in assessing the adequacy of surgical margins, a key metric of breast cancer surgery, in real time. Dr. Kristi Harrington will provide details on the safety and clinical proof of principle data for BLZ-100 to detect breast carcinoma during surgery in 23 patients. BLZ-100 was well tolerated in this study and enhanced fluorescence was demonstrated in pathologically confirmed invasive and in situ carcinoma of the breast.

“Our ultimate goal is to provide the best surgical outcomes for our patients. Initial results support the potential of BLZ-100 to detect cancerous tissue and assess margin status in real time. I look forward to further clinical testing of BLZ-100 as an agent which could provide surgeons and pathologists with the means to reduce the rate of positive margins and decreased re-excision rates,” said Dr. Kristi Harrington.

The clinical study was conducted at Overlake Hospital Medical Center under the direction of principal investigator Kristi Harrington, M.D., Ph.D., and at University of Washington Medical Center under the direction of principal investigator David Byrd, M.D. The now completed study enrolled breast cancer patients at two different dose levels and provided safety and clinical proof of principle data for BLZ-100 to detect breast carcinoma intra-operatively and ex vivo. The study was supported by a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II contract awarded to the company by the National Cancer Institute (NCI)¹.

“The Phase 1 BLZ-100 results in breast cancer are encouraging,” said Heather Franklin, President and CEO of Blaze Bioscience. “This adds breast cancer to the growing list of cancers for which BLZ-100 has demonstrated clinical proof of concept.”

Details of the poster presentation are as follows:
Date: Saturday, April 29, Poster Group 2 Session
Time: 7:30pm-8:30pm Pacific Time
Location: Grand Ballroom 1-3, Bellagio Hotel
Abstract Number: 256376

About BLZ-100

BLZ-100 (tozuleristide) is the first product candidate from Blaze’s Tumor Paint platform and consists of an Optide (optimized peptide) and a fluorescent dye, which emits light in the near-infrared range. Tumor Paint products are designed to provide real-time, high-resolution intraoperative visualization of cancer cells, potentially enabling more precise, complete resection of cancer throughout surgery. Preclinical utility of Tumor Paint technology has been demonstrated in a wide range of cancer types. BLZ-100, an investigational agent, is in Phase I clinical studies to evaluate the safety and imaging characteristics of BLZ-100 in solid tumors. BLZ-100 has achieved clinical proof of concept in brain, breast and skin cancers. Additional potential applications of BLZ-100 include prostate, lung, colorectal and other solid tumor cancers. More details about ongoing trials are available at www.blazebioscience.com or www.clinicaltrials.gov.

About Blaze Bioscience

Blaze Bioscience, Inc. is a privately held biotechnology company dedicated to improving the lives of cancer patients. Blaze was founded in 2010 by Dr. Jim Olson, a pediatric neuro-oncologist at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and Seattle Children’s Hospital, and Heather Franklin, a former member of the executive management team at ZymoGenetics. Blaze is working to develop Tumor Paint products and Optide-based therapeutics. Surgery is first-line therapy for most solid tumor cancers and Tumor Paint products have the potential to improve cancer surgery by providing real-time, high-resolution visualization of cancer cells throughout surgery. The ability to see cancer cells in real time and high resolution throughout surgery should enable better detection and more complete and precise surgical removal of cancer—while sparing surrounding normal tissue. In addition to the Tumor Paint platform, Blaze is collaborating with the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center to discover and develop products based on knottin peptides as part of the Optides platform. This program extends the expertise gained in developing the Tumor Paint platform to optimized knottin peptides for therapeutic and imaging applications. For additional information, please visit www.blazebioscience.com.

¹ $1.5 million of the study will be financed with federal funds from National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health under Contract No. HHSN261201400046C. An estimated twenty-five percent (25%) of costs will be funded by the company.