Quercis Pharma
Next Generation Anti-Thrombotics and Anti-Neoplastic Drugs

Thrombosis is a common and life-threatening complication experienced by cancer patients. The chance of developing a deep vein thrombosis (DVT) increases by 20 to 30 percent when beginning first or secondline chemotherapy.

Quercis Pharma presents oncology professionals and patients with a promising new mechanism to combat thrombosis. In line with the ageold adage ‘prevention is better than cure,’ Quercis Pharma AG develops innovative, safe, and accessible treatments for potentially life-threatening conditions. Quercis’ main drug candidate is a formulation containing Isoquercetin (ISQ950AN) that prevents clotting within the vascular system by drastically reducing the amount of protein disulfide isomerase (PDI) entering the bloodstream. It is not a blood thinner, but rather disrupts the process by which clotting occurs within the vascular system, without increasing bleeding risk. This has the knock-on effect of reducing platelet aggregation and soluble P-Selectin in the patient’s blood.

The company focuses on developing drugs to prevent venous thromboembolism (VTE) in advanced cancer patients and is also conducting clinical trials for ovarian cancer and sickle cell disease. The team at Quercis Pharma prioritizes identifying the underlying causes of cancer and cancer thrombosis and has consequently developed different thiol-isomerase inhibiting drug candidates to treat cancer and prevent thrombosis in cancer patients. Protein disulfide isomerase (PDI) is a key enzyme responsible for platelet aggregation, fibrin generation, and P-Selectin release into the bloodstream, after damage to endothelial cell walls. This causes clotting, DVT, and in some cases embolisms. The discharged PDI also contributes significantly to the metastasis of cancer. Quercis Pharma’s main drug candidate stops the mechanism by which PDI is released. In addition to a multitude of won patents, the company has licenses to patents from large universities such as Harvard, Reading, and WNEU, and routinely collaborates with universities and university hospital systems such as those at UCLA and Harvard in clinical trials. The company is developing a test together with a team of scientists at Harvard that will allow early identification of people at high risk of a thrombotic event resulting in prophylactic treatment that can prevent a life-threatening thrombotic event from occurring. The development test is expected to predict with great accuracy, the likelihood of patients experiencing a thrombotic event during the course of their cancer, and eventually other disease treatments.

Quercis Pharma plans to make its drug available to anybody at high risk of thrombosis. The company, having been inspired by ancient eastern cultures such as Chinese medicine, develops its products utilizing natural resources gathered from various parts of the world. Before administering each drug to patients in clinical trials, the drugs are thoroughly tested for safety. Quercis Pharma also maintains ownership of an FDA IND and a Special Protocol Agreement with the FDA for its phase 3 study in cancer thrombosis. The first new drug from the company is expected to be market ready in 2024.

The company has recently, together with two universities as collaborators, made a significant breakthrough in the treatment of ovarian cancer. In animal studies, ovarian cancer growth is inhibited by as much as 85 percent in less than 60 days when compared to controls.

With robust and promising data in its phase 2 study in cancer thrombosis where non-small cell lung cancer, colorectal cancer, and pancreatic cancer patients participated the Quercis Drug reduced D-Dimer, Thrombin Generation, and P-Selectin in patient’s blood very significantly with no serious adverse events. With new data showing that the drug also acts on the tumors themselves in animals and on an important surrogate marker in humans, Quercis plans to make cancer a liveable chronic disease like arthritis. “If tumors aren’t growing and there is no metastases and thrombosis is not occurring, then one could live with cancer without the need for surgical intervention or chemotherapy. No weight loss, no hair loss, no total panic, and fear of death when your physician says you have cancer. The word ’cancer’ will not inspire fear and foment depression in the future if the work we are doing now is replicated. We will know the answers still in 2022,” says Thomas Lines, CEO of Quercis Pharma.
The company intends to continue developing drugs in the cancer space as well as for sickle cell disease and neurological indications such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), where few options exist. Money will, in no shape, or form, change how it goes about delivering on its mission statement. Quercis Pharma believes that drug development must be focused on the patient and that drug prices in today’s world are disproportionately high in a lot of cases, when one sees the results they deliver for patients. It has a humanitarian aspect at its core that will lead to some of its drugs being available to those less fortunate at a massive discount (as much as 90 percent). For Quercis Pharma the motivation to succeed revolves around winning for the patients. “In the very near future, I see many types of cancer as Chronic Diseases easily treated with “a pill a day” or “a drink a day” and becoming something we can live with without the constant fear that is pervasive among the
cancer patients of today. We are close!” expresses Lines.