How NOT to Write a Biotech Press Release: Just Ask Epeius

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If there is one cardinal sin in biotech communications, it is hype. Telling late-night TV viewers you’ve made a miracle toaster is one thing; telling desperate and dying patients you’ve made a miracle cancer drug is quite another.

Apparently, no one told Epeius Biotechnologies. The little biotech issued a press release last week revealing “more stunning results” seen with Phase II cancer drug Rexin-G. In the company’s words:

Rexin-G has once again accomplished what standard cancer treatments and even much-touted biologics have failed to do: that is, to bring forth the benefits of remission in otherwise intractable metastatic cancers.

The release goes on to describe three case studies, one in which a Catholic priest was “bedridden and in withering pain” from prostate cancer until Rexin-G made his inoperable primary tumor disappear.

Why Epeius chose to discuss case studies — which don’t have much relevance in the randomized-clinical-trial driven world of FDA decisions — in a colorfully-worded press is puzzling. The company is privately-held, so it couldn’t have been trying to pump its stock. But this is not an isolated offense: a second press release last week touted “the first real breakthrough for pancreatic cancer seen in years,” and a trip down Epeius’ press release archives reveals:

Rexin-G is the world’s smallest hero!

and, my personal favorite,

Epeius Biotechnologies draws the sword of targeted gene delivery from the stone of chemistry and physics

The sad thing is that Rexin-G does look like it has some solid activity. Phase I/II data published in Nature’s Molecular Therapy this month showed that gemcitabine-resistant pancreatic cancer patients treated with a low dose had median overall survival of 4.3 months and none survived a year, while the high dose resulted in median overall survival of 9.2 months and one year survival of 28.9 percent. But it’s hard to see the efficacy through the haze of hype.

Sword in the Stone photo by Flickr user Loren Javier, CC.

Tags: Cancer, Rexin-G, Biotechnology, Trista Morrison

Trista Morrison is a staff writer at BioWorld Today, a daily newspaper that's been covering the biotech industry about as long as there's been a biotech industry to cover.

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1

bmartinmd

10/20/09 | Report as spam

RE: How NOT to Write a Biotech Press Release: Just Ask Epeius

Frederick Hall, President and CEO of Epeius, is on my short list of suspect writers, given the ex-squeeze-me style of his quotes:

"It is most fitting that Rexin-G receives its first product registration in the Philippines which brought forth the stellar physician-scientist whose drive and determination to engineer a better medicine made Rexin-G possible, and also it was first in the Philippines where the dedicated clinicians, oncologists, regulatory authorities, and medical institutions worked tirelessly for years to bring this targeted genetic medicine to the bedside."

"In each and every cancer patient extends their very own impedimenta, which deepens and exacerbates with time and ineffectual apothecary. The scientists and physicians at Epeius Biotechnologies are proud to have participated in the historic events that brought these first targeted genetic medicines safely and conscientiously across the threshold of history, bringing hard science gently to the bedside."
2

neotrope

10/21/09 | Report as spam

RE: How NOT to Write a Biotech Press Release: Just Ask Epeius

Well, Epeius is certainly not alone in spreading the hype... that is what "gets read" these days and written about (ahem, case in point ... you're devoting this page to their news... so... hype worked).

I happen to run the news service that has been issuing all of Epeius' releases the past few years, and although we do not write them, we do find them entertaining and they ARE making headway in their goals to find tumor-targeted gene therapies that do something to help metastatic cancers. They ARE doing clinical studies in real clinics, and they do have FDA Orphan Drug status.... so, beyond the hype there is real work being done by real doctors and biomed folk.

So, perhaps a bit more prose than any of us in the media or PR field prefer, but they do get covered and they are succeeding in their PR campaigns, without going too far into cringe-ville (as I call it).

And they are really nice people, too, which is not always the case in the over-hyped bio-med field where there are a lot of short-selling investors running up nutraceuticals and other snake oils. At least Epeius has got something in the pot to look at.

Thanks for the ink!

Christopher Simmons
member: PRSA, ASCAP
CEO, Neotrope(R) / Send2Press(R) Newswire
3

Trista Morrison

10/26/09 | Report as spam

RE: How NOT to Write a Biotech Press Release: Just Ask Epeius

Hi Christopher -

I've no doubt the Epeius folks are nice. And yes, it seems their hype is not aimed to intentionally mislead for some scummy stock-related reason; it's just astonishingly bad writing (and judgment).

But I gotta disagree that hype helps get the word out - yes, I wrote about them, but there's a difference between laughing with someone and laughing at them, and not all press is good press. I think they'd get more attention for their drug if they didn't bury promising data beneath hype.

Trista