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ANZUP ANNUAL REPORT 2020
AT A GLANCE
Below the Belt Research Fund Carole Harris: Using PBS data to understand pattern of care and survival in Australian patients treated for metastatic clear cell kidney cancer
Every cent we raise through the Below the Belt Pedalthon goes directly towards clinical trial research via the Below the Belt Research Fund. In 2019, ANZUP’s Below the Belt Research Fund provided much needed seed funding to support six ANZUP members to progress new trial ideas to the point of becoming full scale studies. These research grants were announced at the 2019 ASM in Brisbane.
Andrew Moe: SUBDUE Our research group is aiming to create a new treatment for patients with bladder cancer. Durvalumab is a medicine that targets the body’s immune cells to help combat bladder cancer. When given intra-venously, durvalumab has proven effective at slowing advanced bladder cancer that has spread to other organs. We hope that this treatment can be used in a larger trial, and long-term could become a standard treatment for high-risk bladder cancer.
ANDREW MOE RECEIVING HIS AWARD FROM GUY TONER
BEN TRAN RECEIVING HIS AWARD FROM GUY TONER
Ben Tran: CLIMATE Assessing the Clinical utility of miR371 as a marker of residual disease in Clinical Stage 1 Testicular Germ Cell Tumour, following orchidectomy. Testicular germ cell tumours (TGCT) are highly curable, even in the metastatic setting where platinumbased chemotherapy is highly effective. Patients diagnosed with clinical stage 1 (CS1) disease are most likely cured following orchidectomy, however, up to 50% do develop recurrence and require intensive courses of curative chemotherapy. A short, less toxic course of adjuvant chemotherapy can be used to reduce the risk of recurrence, but at a significant risk of over treating the large group of patients who will never recur. CLIMATE is an innovative registry-based translational clinical trial in TGCT that will generate preliminary data demonstrating the clinical utility of miR-371 in CS1 disease. CLIMATE will enrol CS1 patients recommended for active surveillance, test for miR-371 at predefined timepoints and correlate these findings with recurrence, leveraging prospectively collected clinical data within iTestis, a national testicular cancer registry.
Our study will describe how medications are used across Australia to treat advanced kidney cancer: which drugs, in which order and for how long. We will understand how long people live with these therapies and if there are sequences of treatment that appear to work better. This study has the advantage that it can look at how cancer therapies are used and how effective they are at a population level. Our future aim will be to use this “linkage data” method as the backbone of real-world clinical trials, where ANZUP members in every hospital in Australia can take part, not just those of us lucky to be in hospitals with many research resources. Real world clinical trials make small changes in the way we use standard treatments, and can have big impacts to improve patients’ outcomes.
CAROLE HARRIS RECEIVING HER AWARD FROM GUY TONER
