A breast cancer drug used in everyday care, including some people whose cancer spread to the brain
Original title: Dalpiciclib combined with endocrine therapy for patients with HR+/HER2- metastatic breast cancer: a multicenter real-world study.
How far along is this research?
- Lab cells
- Animals
- Review
- Tested in people
This was tested in people. That is the most reliable kind of research we share.
This drug is already approved and used in China, but it is not approved everywhere, and this look at brain spread was very small.
The short version
Doctors in China looked back at 160 people who took a breast cancer drug called dalpiciclib, and most went well over a year before their cancer grew again.
What was studied. Doctors at four hospitals in South China looked back at the records of 160 people with a type of breast cancer that had spread. All of them took dalpiciclib along with hormone treatment between January 2022 and March 2025. The doctors checked how long the cancer stayed stable, how many tumors shrank, and what side effects came up.
What they found. For the whole group, the typical time before the cancer got worse was about 20.6 months. In 28 of the 160 people, the tumors shrank. People who took the drug as their first treatment did better, with a typical 26.7 months before the cancer grew, compared with 13.8 months for people who tried it later. A small group of 13 people whose cancer had spread to the brain went about 14.8 months, and 33 people who had already taken a similar drug went about 7.2 months. The most common side effect was low blood counts.
What this means, and what it doesn't
What it could mean: This drug is already approved in China, so this is a look at how it worked in real hospitals rather than in a tightly controlled trial. For people with this kind of breast cancer, it suggests the drug still helps outside of a study. It also gives a first, small hint that it may do something for people whose cancer has reached the brain.
What it doesn't mean: This is not a cure, and it is not a promise of one. This study was about breast cancer that had spread, not about tumors that start in the brain. Only 13 people in it had cancer that spread to the brain, which is far too few to prove anything. Doctors went back through old records here, so they could not control the treatment or compare it fairly with anything else. This drug is approved in China, not in every country, so ask your own doctor what is available to you.
Source: PubMed, July 29, 2026 · Read the original
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