The grant is the maximum awarded by the Department of Defense Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs and creates the Center of Excellence for Individualization of Therapy for Breast Cancer at the IU Cancer Center. The Hoosier Oncology Group, a consortium of oncologists, is a key participant in the study.
It is hoped that by the conclusion of the study, physicians will be able to tailor breast cancer treatments to minimize side effects while improving the response based on the patient's chemistry and tumor type.
George W. Sledge Jr., M.D., the Ballv Lantero Professor of Oncology, is the principal investigator for the study that will utilize the skills of researchers and clinicians from across the country. Kathy Miller, M.D., assistant professor of medicine, will direct the clinical trials program.
The main objective of the study is to use the emerging technologies of genomics, proteomics and pharmacogenetics to predict individual response to standard therapeutic treatment and new drug therapies for patients with advanced breast cancer.
"Individual drugs for advanced breast cancer routinely fail to benefit the majority of women treated. As a result women with advanced disease are faced with progressively less active, progressively more toxic therapy," said Dr. Sledge. "The tragedy of modern therapy is not just its toxicity; rather, it is that so many experience so much toxicity for so little benefit."
Women being treated at multiple sites in Indiana and across the country, as well as in Canada and Peru, South America, for advanced breast cancer will be able to contribute a biopsy of their
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Contact: Mary Hardin
mhardin@iupui.edu
317-274-7722
Indiana University
19-Apr-2004