The Moffitt Cancer Center and the Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center including Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and the Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC-James) have formed what is likely the largest collaboration of its kind to accelerate discoveries in cancer research.
The collaboration named the Oncology Research Information Exchange Network (ORIEN), at www.ORIENcancer.org, will begin with over 100,000 consented patients who have agreed to donate their tissue and clinical data for research to understand cancer at the molecular level.
Through data analysis and sharing, ORIEN will provide physicians evidence of the best therapeutic options, including clinical trial treatments specific to a patient’s biological and epidemiological profile, increase the likelihood of treatment efficacy, speed response time, and potentially minimize side effects while improving outcomes.
Another collaboration involving the Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSK) Cancer Center at www.mskcc.org and Quest Diagnostics at http://QuestDiagostics.com will work together. They have access to MSK’s clinical and research knowledge on gene mutations associated with solid tumors. The goal is to use molecular laboratory testing to improve physicians’ ability to treat patients by giving them a better understanding of the genomic underpinnings of their patients’ illnesses.
In the first phase of the collaboration, MSK will provide information about individual mutations that are identified as part of Quest’s OncoVantage™, an independently validated lab-developed test that enables molecular characterization of solid tumors.
Beginning this summer, physicians who order OncoVantage will benefit from the MSK data through a co-branded clinical annotation report designed to aid in the assessment of a patient’s prognosis as well as to guide treatment selection and monitor disease progression. Over time, the two organizations intend to further study and extend the mutation data sets to potentially generate improved diagnostics plus they plan to do additional research and clinical trials.