Revolution Medicines drug nearly doubles survival in pancreatic cancer trial

A pancreatic cancer pill from Revolution Medicines cut the risk of death by 60% and raised median survival to 13.2 months, a rare large gain in a disease that has resisted decades of treatment advances. The experimental drug, daraxonrasib, also known as RMC-6236, beat standard chemotherapy in a Phase 3 trial of patients with previously treated metastatic pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma.

The study, called RASolute 302, enrolled 501 patients who had already received one prior line of therapy. Revolution Medicines said the global, randomized, open-label trial met all primary and key secondary endpoints, and that the first interim analysis is considered final for progression-free survival and overall survival. Patients taking the daily pill lived a median of 13.2 months versus 6.7 months for those receiving chemotherapy.

The result matters because pancreatic cancer remains one of medicine’s deadliest diagnoses. The American Cancer Society projects 67,530 new U.S. cases and 52,740 deaths in 2026, while the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network says it is the deadliest major cancer and the only major cancer with a five-year survival rate below 20%. The disease is commonly driven by RAS mutations, a target long considered central but difficult to drug, and PDAC accounts for about 90% of pancreatic cancers.

Revolution Medicines said the treatment had a manageable safety profile and no new safety concerns emerged, though rash remains a known side effect. Mark Goldsmith, the company’s chief executive, said the findings were dramatic, practice-changing and unprecedented, and said the immediate goal is to bring the drug to patients who urgently need another option. Brian M. Wolpin, the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute investigator who led the trial, called the result a clear step forward likely to change practice.

The company plans to present the data at the 2026 American Society of Clinical Oncology Annual Meeting and use them in a future new drug application. It is also expected to seek accelerated FDA review through the Commissioner’s National Priority Voucher program, which the agency says can shorten review times from 10-12 months to 1-2 months. If regulators move quickly, daraxonrasib could become a fast-moving second-line option for patients with metastatic disease, while a separate trial in newly diagnosed patients could eventually determine whether the drug moves earlier in treatment.