Groundbreaking New Drug Nearly Doubles Pancreatic Cancer Survival

on PinterestAn experimental new pill, daraxonrasib, significantly improved survival rates of participants with pancreatic cancer.

on PinterestAn experimental new pill, daraxonrasib, significantly improved survival rates of participants with pancreatic cancer. Israel Sebastian/Getty Images

• A new medication performed remarkably well in a phase 3 clinical trial for treating pancreatic cancer.
• The drug daraxonrasib reduced the risk of death by nearly half, as well as shrank tumors in people who were given the drug.
• Pancreatic cancer has the highest mortality rate of all major cancers, and early detection is the key to treating the disease.

A new type of medication is showing promise in the treatment of pancreatic cancer, one of the deadliest forms of cancer.

In a phase 3 clinical trial, the drug daraxonrasib significantly improved survival rates of participants with pancreatic cancer who had previously been treated with chemotherapy.

The researchers found that daraxonrasib reduced the overall risk of death by 60% compared with people with advanced pancreatic cancer who were treated with chemotherapy.

The medication also helped shrink or eliminate tumors among participants in the trial.

The findings were recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine and presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) 2026 annual meeting from May 29 to June 2 in Chicago, IL.

Officials at Revolution Medicines, the manufacturer of daraxonrasib, said the clinical trial results are a major breakthrough in pancreatic cancer treatment.

“These results represent a potentially transformative advance for patients and underscore daraxonrasib’s potential to redefine the treatment landscape,” said Mark Goldsmith, MD, the chief executive officer and chairman of Revolution Medicines, in a statement.

Experimental pancreatic cancer drug shows promise

The RASolute 302 clinical trial involved a total of 500 participants with solid tumors and activating RAS mutations, a gene mutation found in the cancer cells of 92% of pancreatic cancer cases.

Participants were given doses of between 10 milligrams (mg) and 400 mg of daraxonrasib orally once a day, with 300 mg selected as the phase 3 dose.

The researchers focused on 168 participants who had been previously treated with chemotherapy.

The researchers reported that participants using daraxonrasib had an average survival rate of 13 months from diagnosis to death compared to 6 months for participants treated with standard chemotherapy.

In people with a known RAS mutation called G12, tumors remained ⁠under control for a median of about 7 months among participants on daraxonrasib compared to about 3 months for those treated with chemotherapy.

The percentage of patients whose cancer shrank or disappeared was about 33% in patients with the G12 mutation compared to about 12% for people given chemotherapy. Overall, about 31% of trial participants saw their tumors shrink or disappear compared with 11% who received chemotherapy.

Experts not involved in the trial are very encouraged by the findings.

“This is an extraordinarily hopeful moment for the pancreatic cancer field,” said Diane Simeone, MD, the director of the UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center, as well as the founder and chief scientific advisor of the Pancreatic Cancer Early Detection Consortium (PRECEDE), in a statement d with Healthline.

“Pancreatic cancer patients have had far too few effective treatment options,” she added. “The progress around daraxonrasib shows what is possible when long-term scientific

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