Collaboration on Colorectal Cancer Markers

A collaboration has been announced between Biosite Inc. (San Diego, CA, USA) and Oxford Genome Sciences (OGeS, Abington, UK) for the evaluation of protein-based disease markers for colorectal cancer.

The markers will be used to develop blood-based diagnostic products, expanding personalized therapeutic options for colorectal cancer. These blood-based diagnostics will be designed to enable early detection of colorectal patients who have relapsed. The fecal occult blood test and colonoscopy, a highly invasive procedure, are currently used for screening and diagnosing colorectal cancer, which has a 30-40% recurrence rate within an average of 18 months after primary diagnosis.

The OGeS database (the Oxford Genome Anatomy Project) integrates genomic, proteomic, and clinical information derived from blood and tissue studies of a number of diseases. Under the terms of the collaboration, OGeS will identify at least 25 proteins in blood and tissue samples from relapsing colorectal cancer patients, and Biosite will develop blood-based diagnostic tests using one or more of these biomarkers.

"We are increasingly interested in studying selected areas of cancer that can benefit from rapid, effective, non-invasive diagnostic technologies,” said Kim Blickenstaff, chairman and CEO of Biosite. "This collaboration expands our research by providing us with access to high quality validation of potentially valuable protein biomarkers.”

The CEO of OGeS, Christian Rohlff, observed that relapsing disease is the major cause of suffering and death in colorectal cancer patients, and there is a lack of clinical tools to help physicians decide whom to treat and whether to treat with chemotherapy. He said, "This collaboration with Biosite underpins our corporate objective of applying new strategies in the field of personalized medicine in oncology to improve patient outcomes.”



Related Links:
Biosite Inc.
Oxford Genome Sciences