FDA accepts approval application for AstraZeneca's vandetanib

LONDON The Food and Drug Administration has accepted AstraZeneca’s regulatory application for an investigational cancer drug, the Anglo-Swedish drug maker said Thursday.

AstraZeneca announced the FDA’s acceptance of its application for vandetanib, a drug for treating patients with advanced medullary thyroid cancer. The agency gave the drug priority review status and expected to take action on it in January.

More than 44,000 new cases of thyroid cancer will be diagnosed in the United States this year, according to the American Cancer Society, and medullary thyroid cancer accounted for 5% of thyroid cancers overall.