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The cremaphor formulation of paclitaxel has dose limiting toxicity which prevent its use for pancreatic cancer. Paclitaxel’s toxicity like the majority of chemotherapeutics stems from its systemic delivery and toxicity to normal cells. However recently an albumin-bound formulation (nab-paclitaxel) has demonstrated increased survival times in combination with gemcitabine compared to gemcitabine alone [1]. And now a new biodegradable device has been developed which can deliver chemotherapeutics including paclitaxel directly to the pancreas limiting systemic toxicities [2].

The device has been tested with paclitaxel and shown favourable results in mouse xenograft models over systemically delivered paclitaxel. The device is flexible and can be surgically placed over the pancreatic tumour where it rests delivering a steady flow of paclitaxel for the duration of the treatment. The one time insertion is an attractive aspect compared with repeated intravenous deliveries.

Improving delivery and dosing of existing pancreatic cancer chemotherapeutics is a growing…