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Other News
Concept Development Workshops supported by Below the Belt Pedalthon
In November 2014 four concept development workshops held over two days took place in Sydney. It was the first time ANZUP had been able to bring these workshops together. The funding to allow this to happen came directly from the inaugural Below the Belt Challenge.
In 2015, our corporate and community partners will join us on Tuesday 1 September at Sydney Motorsport Park, Eastern Creek to do it all again. We are looking forward to welcoming more than 40 teams whose riding and fundraising efforts will once again provide much needed untied funding to ANZUP.
Race Founder Simon Clarke said, “I am delighted to be involved in the Pedalthon again and am so proud of the $225,000 we were able to donate to ANZUP last year. I encourage all ANZUP members to support the ride by either riding in a team or sponsoring the ANZUP/CTC teams”. Simon has been seconded to New York for a year but is still actively involved in pursuing sponsors and additional teams. We are very grateful to Simon and the Clarke and Jones families for their financial support and the time they are committing to the ride.
The race is unique in style as it is focussed on the corporate sector, is on a closed circuit and is all over in one day. Teams pay a registration fee of $2,000, and each rider is asked to raise at least $500. Last year, some teams were supported by matched giving in addition to their individual fundraising; please keep that in mind if you have any interested family members or any friends in Sydney based corporates.
Further details about the Pedalthon can be found at www.belowthebelt.org.au.
Participants from around Australia and New Zealand in Sydney for the inaugural two day Concept Development Workshop
Craig Gedye presenting is concept “Single arm phase I/II biomarker enriched trial of safety, tolerability and activity of metronomic vinorelbine (Navelbine®) in patients with pre-treated metastatic clear cell renal cell carcinoma
CTC’s Karen Bracken (Sydney), Trial Nurse Co-ordinator Kath Schubach (Melbourne) and Urological Registrar Steve McCombie (Perth)
OTHER NEWS continued
ANZUP Membership benefits include:
• Access to a multidisciplinary network for Urogenital and Prostate cancer researchers, including clinicians, nurses, psychologists, scientists, allied health and consumer representatives • Opportunity to contribute to the scientific and strategic development of ANZUP through its SAC and subcommittees • Support for the development of investigator-initiated studies • Mentoring and support of young investigators across all our research activities • ANZUP newsletter UPdate and regular sector news updates • Discounted registration at ANZUP’s annual scientific meeting • Access to educational resources, workshops and seminars • Access to grant opportunities • Voting rights at ANZUP annual general meeting and other general meetings • Other benefits that will be extended from time to time for members only Please join the group and take advantage of the many opportunities for training and mentorship. Maybe you’ll be a future leader of genitourinary cancer research, and maybe you’ll make the current leaders less crusty. There is no membership fee and membership does not need to be renewed annually. Find out more http:// www.anzup.org.au/members.aspx.
Upcoming 2015 Events
MAY 17 Sydney Half Marathon ANZUP fundraiser http://www.smhhalfmarathon.com.au
MAY 29 - JUNE 2 2015 ASCO Annual Meeting, Chicago http://am.asco.org/
JUNE 14 - 16 Cancer Nurses Society Winter Congress, Perth http://www.cnsawintercongress.com.au/
JULY 12 - 14 ANZUP ASM Sydney http://www.anzup.org.au/content.aspx?page=asm-home
AUG 17 - 21 The Prostate Cancer World Congress, Cairns http://prostatecancercongress.org.au/
SEPT 1 Below the Belt Pedalthon ANZUP fundraiser Sydney http://www.belowthebelt.org.au/
OCT 5 - 7 International Cancer Imaging Society Meeting, London http://www.icimagingsociety.org.uk/ index.cfm?task=meetings&meetingid=76
OCT 21 Best of GU, Brisbane - More details to come!
OCT 29 - NOV 1 The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Radiologists’ 2015 Annual Scientific Meeting Adelaide) http://www.ranzcr2015.com/
NOV 17 - 19 Clinical Oncology Society of Australia’s (COSA) Annual Scientific Meeting 2015 Hobart, www.cosa.org.au
OTHER NEWS continued
USANZ Conference Report
The 68th Annual Scientific Meeting (ASM) of the Urological Society of Australia & New Zealand (USANZ) was held at the Adelaide Convention Centre between 11 and 14 April, 2015. Convenor John Miller and Scientific program co-ordinator Dan Spernat developed an interesting and varied program covering the breadth of urological interests. The 800 attendees included urologists, trainees, nurses and a small but interested group of other specialties.
The meeting began with a day of workshops, including the first ever conjoint USANZ-ANZUP workshop on Clinical Trial Development. Generously sponsored by Astra Zeneca, the workshop was chaired by Martin Stockler, with Dickon Hayne and Venu Chalasani being the other faculty members. Approximately twenty registrants, including trainees and consultants from Australia, New Zealand and a number of other countries, were taken along the pathway from an idea to developing a clinical trial in the first half of the workshop. The remainder of the workshop then discussed various case studies, including recently developed ANZUP trials and trial concepts brought forward from the audience. The workshop was very well received and represents yet another achievement in the collaboration between ANZUP and USANZ.
Later in the day, the ANZUP bladder cancer subcommittee utilized the availability of many interested members to hold a very productive meeting focused on developing the OPTIMUM and ACCEPT trials. OPTIMUM, led by Martin Stockler, aims to implement a factorial trial design to examine adjuvant vs neo-adjuvant chemotherapy (and accelerated MVAC vs Gem-Cis as regimes) with cystectomy for the treatment of invasive urothelial carcinoma of the bladder. Application for funding is currently under review. ACCEPT, led by Dickon Hayne, is a proposed trial of early recovery measures after cystectomy, which may ideally be added on to OPTIMUM in due course. ANZUP thanks USANZ for facilitating the trial development meeting.
The main scientific program of the ASM kicked off with back-to-back plenary sessions on Sunday morning. Topics relevant to GU oncology included recent developments in managing bladder cancer and a panel discussion on management of small renal masses.
Sunday afternoon saw the ANZUP session on urooncology, carrying on an initiative that started from the 2014 ASM in Brisbane. Chaired by Dickon Hayne and Shomik Sengupta, the session began with an introduction to ANZUP, highlighting its portfolio of trials, particularly the surgically relevant trials – SORCE, RAVES and BCG-MMC. The remainder of the session focused on the multi-disciplinary management of prostate cancer, featuring James Eastham, urologist from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Centre, on surgery for high-risk prostate cancer, Alberto Bossi, radiation oncologist from Villejuis, on radiotherapy for high-risk prostate cancer and Francis Parnis, medical oncologist from Adelaide, speaking on systemic therapy for metastatic prostate cancer. The quality of this session was greatly appreciated by the sizable audience, and planning is already underway to include a similar session in the 2016 ASM.
The remainder of the scientific program featured a number of other sessions on urological oncology. Highlights included the neoadjuvant use of tyrosinekinase inhibitors for renal cancer, current role of cytoreductive nephrectomy, management of upper tract urothelial carcinoma and PSMA PET for prostate cancer. The USANZ ASM continues to build as a world class meeting, and the 2016 meeting at the Gold Coast Convention Centre promises to be bigger and better again.
SHOMIK SENGUPTA
REGISTER NOW
COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT FORUM
SOFITEL SYDNEY WENTWORTH SUNDAY 12 JULY 2015 1PM – 4PM FREE ENTRY BUT BOOKINGS ESSENTIAL www.anzup.org.au
The forum will provide the public with information on ANZUP and the importance of clinical trials in improving treatment for people diagnosed with prostate, bladder, kidney or testicular cancer.
Thankyou to our 2015 Corporate Supporters
We are very grateful for the infrastructure support we receive from Cancer Australia however the funds are not sufficient to support ANZUP’s increasing research activities. In 2012 we established our Corporate Supporter program and are delighted that this program has continued to grow. Through this program we have made significant inroads to supporting and facilitating better engagement with our members. We welcome and acknowledge our corporate supporters and partners for 2015.
ANZUP Cancer Trials Group Limited Locked Bag 77, Camperdown NSW 1450 Lifehouse Building, Level 6 119-143 Missenden Rd Camperdown NSW 2050 Tel: +61 2 9562 5033 Email: info@anzup.org.au www.anzup.org.au
