Prostate Cancer UK funds new study using ANGLE’s Parsortix
The liquid biopsy group (AGL ) has received funding approval from Prostate Cancer UK for a significant clinical study at Barts Cancer Institute, Queen Mary University of London.
The study will investigate the use of the Parsortix® system to isolate circulating tumour cells (CTCs) as a predictor of future disease recurrence. ANGLE, whose proven patent protected platforms include a circulating tumour cell (CTC) harvesting technology, believes the clinical study has potential to set a new standard of care in an area of high unmet medical need.
If this can be done reliably, assessing whether prostate cancer is likely to progress may have a major bearing on whether radical prostatectomy surgery is the most appropriate treatment.
The trial, which is being funded by a £0.75m grant from Prostate Cancer UK approved today, will follow 200 male patients with localised prostate cancer over the course of five years to see whether the presence of mesenchymal CTCs and CTC clusters in peripheral blood, assessed using the Parsortix system, can predict whether the cancer will eventually spread.
The study has been designed and will be conducted by Barts Cancer Institute and is being funded by Prostate Cancer UK, both independently from ANGLE which has agreed to provide support for the study through the provision of Parsortix instruments, cassettes and reagents.
The study, the design of which has been informed by earlier pilot studies independently conducted at Barts Cancer Institute using the Parsortix system, will enrol patients who are due to have radical prostatectomy surgery and will track them during and after treatment.
As part of the study, researchers will take a blood sample before and at regular intervals after the surgery and process the samples using the Parsortix system seeking to identify those patients where disease progression subsequently occurs. ANGLE explained that the trial is blinded, so the doctors treating the patients will not know the outcome of the blood tests.
If Parsortix can be used to provide a predictive assessment of disease progression despite radical prostatectomy, it could have a significant impact on how this type of cancer is treated, ‘making it easier for doctors to choose the correct and most effective treatment option,’ it said.
Prostate cancer is currently the leading cause of cancer in men with 1 in 8 men diagnosed in their lifetime. In the UK, more than 47,500 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer each year and a further 400,000 are living with and after prostate cancer. At least 60% of prostate cancers diagnosed are indolent and unlikely to cause harm during a patient’s lifetime.
Despite this percentage, many men will undergo radical prostatectomy which is associated with significant harms including urinary incontinence and erectile dysfunction, and there is equal risk associated with undertreatment of aggressive disease; in fact, more than 11,500 men, or one man every 45 minutes dies from prostate cancer in the UK each year, it states.
Liquid biopsy could offer a safer, cost-effective diagnosis, active surveillance and, following diagnosis, potential longitudinal monitoring and up to date targeted treatment selection.
Yong-Jie Lu, lead researcher of the study and Professor of Molecular Oncology at Barts Cancer Institute at Queen Mary
University, commented: “If our hypothesis is correct, we hope that this blood test will become the future standard of care for these patients. Patients with localised prostate cancer will be treated more efficiently and in a more personalised way, rather than surgically removing the prostate and just waiting to see what happens.”
Lu explains that doctors will have more information about whether the cancer has really spread or not, based on this test “meaning patients won’t be over or under-treated.”
Dr Hayley Luxton, Research Impact Manager of Prostate Cancer UK, the registered charity in England and Wales, said she is “delighted to support this trial which has the potential to inform treatment decisions and improve outcomes for men living with prostate cancer.”
ANGLE’s Founder and Chief Executive, Andrew Newland, told investors: “Our aim is that the Parsortix system will be widely adopted by third parties seeking from their own initiative and funding to develop many and varied uses of the Parsortix system to support cancer patients.”
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