Sudbury doctor launches new breast cancer clinical trial
Currently no way to test which breast cancer chemo patients are benefiting from treatments early on
A Sudbury doctor and Laurentian University professor has launched a clinical trial for breast cancer, expected to determine early on which patients are responding to chemotherapy treatment.
Dr. Amadeo Parissenti is leading the research. He stated in a press release today that the clinical trials will include more than 500 patients across Europe and North America who have invasive breast cancer.
"One of the big problems with breast cancer chemotherapy is that often we don't know which patients are responding to treatment and who are not," Parissenti said.
Parissenti said a needle is inserted into the tumour, and a biopsy extracted. The sample is studied in Sudbury, measuring its RNA quality. A low measurement means the tumour is dying, while a higher number means the treatment was not effective.
An 'obvious need' for this type of diagnostic
"For breast cancer, on average, about 70 per cent of patients don't get a survival benefit," he said. "You can see the obvious need for diagnostics like this, because the majority don't repsond."
Those who are responding can continue, those who are not can continue to to other treatments, like surgery, other therapies, or drugs, Parissenti said.
Because of the wide international interest in the clinical trials — Ireland, Germany and Italy have joined with Canada and the U.S.— he is expecting the trials to be completed in two years.
And pending reports of another publication, Parissenti said this type of diagnostic may be used for other cancer types, not just breast cancer.
Personalized treatment solutions
Janet McElhaney, Scientific Director at Health Sciences North, said the launch of the trial is an important step for breast cancer research.
"This research by Dr. Parissenti..will help provide personalized treatment solutions for patients as part of their cancer journey in the north and internationally," McElhaney said.
RDA was developed by Parissenti and Dr. Baoqing Guo of Health Sciences North Research Institute. Laurentian has licensed the technology exclusively to RNA Diagnostics Inc., a Canadian molecular diagnostics company that develops diagnostic tools to improve chemotherapy management.