(CNN) -- A cancer treatment that comes in a pill is as effective as the standard chemotherapy for lung patients who had previously been treated for their cancer, according to a study released Thursday. The intravenous chemotherapy treatment had more severe side effects than the pill in this study. Results of a large clinical trial were published in the British medical journal The Lancet. The trial was designed to compare Iressa, a daily pill, to Taxotere, an IV-chemotherapy drug that's administered every three weeks. This international study included more than 1,400 patients for whom standard chemotherapy had been ineffective. "Iressa and Taxotere have same survival outcomes," according to Dr. Edward Kim, lead author of the study and assistant professor in M.D. Anderson Cancer Center's Department of Thoracic/Head and Neck Medical Oncology in Houston, Texas.Study compared pill Iressa and IV-chemotherapy drug TaxoterePatients taking Iressa mainly experienced skin rashes and/or mild diarrheaPatients on Taxotere had many more severe side effects, including hair lossExperts: Unknown whether FDA will allow new patients to be treated with Iressa
Given this information and because another lung cancer pill -- Tarceva -- had shown a survival benefit, the FDA decided that " it is not reasonable to start new patients on _."