Arne Östman at Karolinska Institutet has been awarded SEK 6 million by the Erling-Persson Foundation. The funding will support a clinical study investigating whether an existing drug can help other cancer drugs reach liver metastases more effectively.
Cancer drugs can have difficulty penetrating solid tumours. One reason is that pressure within the tumour is often high. At the same time, the risk of side effects limits the doses that can be given to patients.
Previous studies have shown that blocking the protein PDGFRβ can reduce pressure within tumours. This may help drugs reach tumour cells more easily and improve the effectiveness of treatment.
"Many cancer drugs are effective against tumour cells in the laboratory but may struggle to reach them within a patient's tumour. Our study is based on the idea that we can change the tumour microenvironment and thereby make existing treatments more effective," says Arne Östman , senior professor at the Department of Oncology-Pathology , Karolinska Institutet.
The study will be conducted as a collaboration between several research groups. In addition to Östman's group, participants from Karolinska Institutet include Marco Gerling, Jennie Engstrand, Rimma Axelsson, Thuy Tran and Antonios Tzortzakakis. Kristian Pietras at Lund University and Olof Eriksson at Antaros Medical will also contribute.
PET scans to identify patients most likely to benefit
The IMAGINE clinical study consists of several substudies. Initially, the researchers will test a new PET tracer, 68Ga-ATH001, in 10-20 patients. The tracer makes it possible to visualise how much PDGFRβ is present in the tumours. The results will be compared with analyses of tissue samples.
These analyses will assess whether PET scans can help identify the patients most likely to benefit from the treatment.
An existing drug used in a new way
In the later part of the study, the researchers will compare current standard treatment with standard treatment combined with imatinib. This approved cancer drug will be used in a new way in the project.
As imatinib's patent has expired, the drug is considerably less expensive than many new cancer drugs. If the approach proves effective, it could therefore offer a cost-effective way to improve current treatments.
Around 10,000 people are treated for liver metastases in Sweden each year. The researchers believe that, in the longer term, this treatment approach could also be used for other types of metastatic cancer.
"If the study produces positive results, it could lay the groundwork for a new way of combining cancer treatments. In the longer term, we hope that this approach will benefit patients with several different types of metastatic cancer," says Arne Östman.
