Message from the Chair

Message from the Chair continued

our delegates, not only for the warm glow that the positive comments always bring, but to make sure that we are meeting our delegates’ needs and hearing their thoughts on how the meeting could be improved.

This year’s ASM also incorporated the Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia’s annual Prostate Cancer Specialist Nursing Service conference. This was part of the recent agreement signed between ANZUP and PCFA whereby both organisations would participate in fundraising to support ANZUP prostate cancer clinical trials. It was great to have a part of the program dedicated to prostate specialist nurses and of course to have their involvement in the wider ASM as well. The 2017 ASM will be held in Melbourne and we are very fortunate to have Carmel Pezaro as our convenor. More news will follow soon but you can already pencil in the dates: 16-18 July 2017.

The ANZUP company Annual General Meeting was held on 11 July 2016 and it was a great pleasure to show how ANZUP is ploughing more and more of its resources back into clinical trials and development opportunities. The Board has worked very hard on refreshing our Strategic Plan, now available on our website. Behind the high level strategic plan is a detailed operational plan listing specific goals, actions, timelines and deliverables. The Board, our CEO Marg McJannett and our hardworking secretariat now all have the task of making these goals a reality. Some of them are quite aspirational but we have learned from our experience with ANZUP that what seemed unlikely a few years ago quite quickly becomes reality.

Clincal Trials

ANZUP’s clinical trials program continues to accelerate in both depth and breadth. We have clinical trials active across all of our disease types and involving the various disciplines we represent. Not all of our clinical trials are the conventional “test a drug” ones; we also have studies involving surgery, radiotherapy, nursing and allied health input, psycho-oncology, supportive care, health economics and research translational questions. You can read more about all of this on our website and of course the ANZUP ClinTrials Refer app is available for anyone to download and use to find out details of each trial. We are excited to be expanding our presence yet further, with involvement of the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) and some additional US sites for our ENZARAD trial, and linking with the US National Cancer Institute and the Alliance group for the forthcoming TIGER testicular cancer trial. Not only will these new strategic links help us in our current trials, but importantly they represent the advent of a new global cooperative intergroup structure that will be a unique vehicle for performing large scale international trials in the future.

ASM CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT SESSION

Concept Development Workshops

There has been a considerable amount of ANZUP activity outside the direct trials arena as well. We have already held two Concept Development Workshops in May (germ cell and prostate) and another workshop at the ASM. The bladder and renal CDWs will be held in August. A key outcome of the prostate CDW was to refine and shortlist proposals for funding through the joint ANZUP/PCFA mechanism mentioned above. A SAC subcommittee met in June to review and rank the proposals. We are delighted to announce that the first trial supported through this initiative will be insert details led by Dr Michael Hoffman. We are now deep into the process of developing the full trial documentation and setting up all the systems necessary to open this trial as soon as possible. Watch this space! We look forward to more concepts coming through this and other mechanisms for funding support, but it is particularly gratifying to see that ANZUP is now in the position to help support this research directly instead of depending on the unreliable prospects of competitive grant funding. Our aim is to continue to improve this capability and capacity into the future.

Message from the Chair continued

ANZUP hosted its second GU Preceptorship in Prostate Cancer in August 2016. The 2015 Preceptorship was extremely successful and we are looking forward to hosting it again this year. Many thanks to Eva Segelov for her amazing Symposium and drive in making this happen. ANZUP will also be hosting the Best of GU evening later in the year, reviewing the highlights of the ANZUP and USANZ annual meetings.

Below the Belt Pedalthon

Of course you will all already be aware that Tuesday 20 September 2016 will see the third annual ANZUP Below the Belt Pedalthon fundraising event at Eastern Creek in NSW. This is a great day for everyone involved and importantly all the revenue from the event goes to the Below the Belt Research Fund. This is another example of how ANZUP continues to grow its resources and at the same time re-invest them to support the work we need to do. Sadly Liz Thorp “left” ANZUP some time ago but, as the inverted commas imply, in reality she has donated an enormous amount of time since then in helping lock in the arrangements for the Pedalthon. Liz’s oversized clown shoes are now being filled by our new Marketing and Communications Manager, Lucy Byers. Lucy brings great expertise and experience and I encourage you to say hello to her when you meet her at an ANZUP function soon.

The Pedalthon is perhaps our major external fundraising event at the moment but there is a real need to continue to grow our fundraising capability. We have been fortunate to obtain a one-year extension on our Cancer Australia Support for Clinical Trials grant, but our vision continues to exceed our reach and we know that we will need more resources to do the work we and our patients need us to do. ANZUP also provides a range of other fundraising or donation opportunities as you will see on our web site. We also have the EverydayHero option allowing you to link to ANZUP as a beneficiary to fun runs or other activities. A large number of people are quietly making a substantial difference this way or through direct donations and we are extremely grateful. Thank you to all of you who support us in this way.

As always, I cannot end this without acknowledging the people behind the scenes who work so hard to make possible what we do. Thanks to my fellow Board directors; our ANZUP staff (Anne, AJ and Lucy); our indefatigable CEO Marg McJannett; our committee chairs and deputy chairs and members; the SAC; the CAP, our volunteers Lesley Tinkler and Jo Stubbs; our colleagues and collaborators at NHMRC Clinical Trials Centre, the Centre of Centre for Biostatistics and Clinical Trials (BaCT) and elsewhere; our corporate supporters, sponsors and donors; our “real life” employers who understand the importance of this work we do; and our families who patiently wait for us and support us. ANZUP and what it does is only possible because there are so many people who are driven by their generosity and good will to donate their time and resources. Just imagine if we had to buy what it is that you all bring so cheerfully; I’m not even sure that’s possible. “Thanks” just seems far too small a word to express what we feel.

Please enjoy this edition of UPdate.

IAN DAVIS CHAIR.

DELEGATES AT THE 2016 ANZUP ASM

CONVENOR REPORT CONTINUED

Spirited discussion was enjoyed during the ANZUP Concept Development Session, which was followed up with updates from the Community Advisory Panel and subcommittee chairs. The Best of the Best Oral presentations demonstrated the quality and breadth of research being undertaken by ANZUP members, as too did the record number of poster presentations. A busy Monday was very enjoyably rounded out with the conference dinner in the Hilton Ballroom, which included some of our local and international faculty demonstrating that their skills in the clinic are equally matched on the dance floor.

Tuesday started early with breakfast and the opportunity to “meet the Professor” Dr Dean Bajorin. Dean gave an inspiring message of mentorship, why he is an academic oncologist and how and why he has led the fellowship program at MSKCC. It was inspiring for trainees and challenging for those of us given the honour and privilege of training the next generation of leaders.

The rest of Tuesday included state of the art presentations on less common tumours such as penile and testis cancer and Dr Bajorin presented the latest data on immune therapy in bladder cancer. A session was devoted to the important topics of the younger GU oncology patient and rehabilitation. We were extremely fortunate to have Freddie Hamdy involved in the meeting and “present” through the wonders of technology, a fantastic talk on surgical research and clinical trials. Outstanding presentations from local faculty on the latest in translational research in GU oncology and how we can include such approaches in clinical trial design gave food for thought.

Piet Ost gave a fascinating talk on the role of ablation of oligometastatic prostate cancer and then backed up to be involved in possibly one of the greatest debates ever seen anywhere, anytime – “Cytoreductive RRP (or EBRT to the prostate) is a good idea in men present with synchronous mets”. Our local dream team of Peter Heathcote and Joe Bucci put a well-constructed and spirited argument together for the negative however were pipped at the post by the affirmative team of Piet “Iolaus” Ost and Venu “Hercules” Chalasani. I am sure no-one present will ever look at a Mentos in quite the same way. The meeting closed with awards for the best presentations in various categories and the 2016 Tolmar ANZUP Clinical Research Fellowship was awarded to Dr Arun Azad, medical oncologist and translational researcher from Monash Health in Melbourne.

My job as convenor was very easy due to the fantastic support and work of the extra-ordinary convening committee (with special thanks to the local team of David Pryor, Tanya Holt, Shona Mackenzie and Aneta Suder), the ANZUP secretariat and the YRD team. This dedicated group ensured this year’s ASM was the most successful and largest to date and demonstrates how ANZUP is going from strength to strength.

No matter how much hard work is put in from the organizing committee, the meeting itself would not be possible without the generous support of our sponsors: Platinum sponsors Janssen and PCFA; Gold Sponsors Sanofi, Amgen, Astellas, Bristol-Myers Squibb, ImmunoOncology and Novartis Oncology; Silver sponsors Ipsen, Ferring, Tolmar Australia and Bayer; and Bronze sponsor Pfizer Oncology.

Planning is already well underway for next year and we look forward to welcoming you to Melbourne, for an even bigger and more successful ANZUP ASM.

IAN VELA 2016 Convenor

DELEGATES AT THE 2016 ANZUP ASM