We are delighted to announce that Grant Stewart, Chair of Kidney Cancer UK’s ‘Kidney Cancer Accord‘ steering group,  is to take up the position of Chair of Surgical Oncology from the beginning of February. In his new role, Grant will lead academic surgical oncology and ensure that Cambridge continues to be a world leader in this discipline.

Grant is an academic kidney cancer surgeon operating on around 70 patients with the disease every year. He introduced the robotic kidney cancer surgery programme in Addenbrooke’s in 2016 which significantly improves patient recovery time.

Grant also established the Cambridge Renal Cancer (CamRenCan) Collaborative, a group of over 40 clinicians, translational and basic scientists working together to optimise the management of patients with initially localised renal cancer. Under his leadership a range of new clinical trial options are now available for patients with localised kidney cancer in Cambridge and across the UK.

Grant’s translational research focus is on developing biomarkers to enable early detection of kidney cancer, identification of patients at high risk of disease recurrence, allowing improved patient follow-up, and prediction of patient response to systemic therapy.

“I am delighted to have been appointed as Professor of Surgical Oncology at the University of Cambridge,” said Grant. “My aim is to undertake internationally leading surgical oncology research that will result in impactful paradigm shifts in patient care and outcomes from cancer.

“Becoming the Chair of Surgical Oncology provides a unique opportunity for me to work with clinical and research colleagues across surgical specialities, galvanising clinical, translational and basic science research into cancers beyond my immediate clinical and research niche of kidney cancer.”

Before moving to Cambridge in 2015, Grant spent seven years as a Lecturer and Senior Lecturer in the internationally renowned Department of Surgery at the University of Edinburgh where he gained experience in working across multiple surgical oncology subspecialties.

“The appointment of Grant to this important role marks the end of a long and diligent international search,” said Professor Richard Gilbertson, Centre Director. “We are absolutely delighted that Grant has accepted this new role. His leadership of both clinical and research enterprises in Cambridge have been exemplary and we all look forward to working with him further across the CRUK Cambridge Centre.”

“We are absolutely delighted that Grant has accepted this important position. The role furthers our ambition to deliver translational research, linking basic science to the clinic. More specifically, this addresses our strategic development of surgical oncology across many areas of surgical practice,” said Professor Andrew McCaskie, Head of Department of Surgery.

London: Researchers at Cardiff University have discovered a new type of killer T-cell that offers hope of a “one-size-fits-all” cancer therapy. These T-cells were shown, in the lab, to kill lung, skin, blood, colon, breast, bone, prostate, ovarian, kidney and cervical cancer cells, while ignoring healthy cells.

T-cell therapies for cancer – where immune cells are removed, modified and returned to the patient’s blood to seek and destroy cancer cells – are the latest paradigm in cancer treatments. The most widely-used therapy, known as CAR-T, is personalised to each patient but targets only a few types of cancers and has not been successful for solid tumours.

Cardiff researchers have now discovered T-cells equipped with a new type of T-cell receptor (TCR) which recognises and kills most human cancer types, while ignoring healthy cells. According to researchers, it was “highly unusual” to find a TCR with such broad cancer specificity and this raised the prospect of “universal” cancer therapy.

“We hope this new TCR may provide us with a different route to target and destroy a wide range of cancers in all individuals,” said Professor Andrew Sewell, lead author on the study and an expert in T-cells from Cardiff University’s School of Medicine.

This TCR recognises a molecule present on the surface of a wide range of cancer cells as well as in many of the body’s normal cells but, remarkably, is able to distinguish between healthy cells and cancerous ones, killing only the latter.

The study, published in Nature Immunology, describes a unique TCR that can recognise many types of cancer via a single HLA-like molecule called MR1. Unlike HLA, MR1 does not vary in the human population – meaning it is a hugely attractive new target for immunotherapies.

The researchers said it offers “exciting opportunities for pan-cancer, pan-population” immunotherapies not previously thought possible.

“Cancer-targeting via MR1-restricted T-cells is an exciting new frontier – it raises the prospect of a ‘one-size-fits-all’ cancer treatment; a single type of T-cell that could be capable of destroying many different types of cancers across the population,” elaborated Sewell.

Read the full article on Timesnownews.com here

For the study, researchers conducted a literature review and network meta-analysis of phase 2/3 randomized controlled trials of approved first-line TKI therapies for mRCC.

Cabozantinib, sunitinib, pazopanib, and tivozanib show similar efficacy for the treatment of metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC), but tivozanib’s safety profile is superior to the profiles of the other tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) drugs, according to the results of a network meta-analysis published in the journal Advances in Therapy. Tivozanib is currently approved for the treatment of advanced renal cell carcinoma in Europe2 but is not currently approved for use for this indication in the United States.

For the study, researchers conducted a literature review and network meta-analysis of phase 2/3 randomized controlled trials of approved first-line TKI therapies for mRCC. The researchers searched several major databases, including PubMed, ClinicalTrials.gov and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, for related English-language publications using relevant search terms.

The researchers selected progression-free survival (PFS) or in some cases, time-to-progression (TTP) as the measure indicating a drug’s efficacy. The investigators analyzed toxicity by examining the proportion of patients who experienced grade 3/4 adverse events. After conducting the literature search, the authors identified 12 studies involving more than 4200 patients that met the authors’ criteria. The researchers then performed statistical analyses to determine the efficacy and toxicity outcomes.

And, many experts warn that direct comparisons of treatments should only occur in head-to-head randomized controlled trials, as study conditions within each trial vary.

When the researchers looked at the indirect efficacy of treatments compared with placebo, they noted a significant difference between cabozantinib, sunitinib at standard regimen (50 mg qd 4/2), pazopanib, tivozanib, and sorafenib treatments vs placebo. However, the efficacy of sunitinib (administered at 50 mg qd 2/1 and 37.5 mg continuous daily dose) was not significantly different from placebo.

Cabozantinib appeared to have the highest probability of being the best treatment option in terms of PFS among the TKIs, with a P score .948. In comparison, the P score for sunitinib was .7411, .6914 for pazopanib, and .5988 for tivozanib. But indirect comparison of treatments with cabozantinib showed that there was no significant difference in PFS between the TKIs. This finding, however, did not apply to sorafenib, which was linked to a shorter PFS.

When the authors compared the toxicity of cabozantinib and other TKIs, they found that tivozanib, placebo, and interferon-alpha yielded a lower likelihood of grade 3 or grade 4 adverse events than sunitinib, pazopanib and sorafenib. Other analyses showed that tivozanib was most likely to have the least toxicity compared with the other TKI treatments, and that its safety profile for grade 3/4 adverse events was superior.

“Taken together, it is not possible to produce a clear hierarchy of first-line TKIs based on significant differences in efficacy,” the authors wrote in the paper. “Consequently, the toxicity of these TKIs may play a more significant role in treatment decisions.”

Anas Al-Janadi, MD, vice president of oncology for Spectrum Health Cancer Center in Grand Rapids, Michigan, who was not involved in the study, said that the finding about the equal efficacy of the drugs was not unexpected. However, “the statement about toxicity may not reflect a true difference between the drugs and it might be simply as a result of improved clinical skills of treating physicians and better knowledge and management of expected toxicities,” he said.

Read the full article on Cancer Therapy Advisor here

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The ‘Kidney Cancer UK Accord: Consensus Statement’ seeks to establish a common pathway for all patients across England and Wales.

Kidney cancer is the 7th most common cancer in the UK. Of the six cancers that are more common than kidney cancer, only lung cancer is more difficult to treat successfully.

As such, kidney cancer is a significant cancer in an important organ within the body. However, there is a low level of awareness of kidney cancer and the symptoms that patients may present with. Also, although there are pockets of excellence, there is significantly less research and funding for research into this cancer compared to other cancers – particularly in the area of non-metastatic disease. These factors are reflected in the lack of an agreed quality framework around key aspects of the patient pathway.

This Consensus Statement aims to develop the key elements of good quality in kidney cancer care across England and Wales. In due course this will be supported by a set of Quality Performance Indicators. The aim is the development of an overarching NICE Clinical Guideline for kidney cancer, similar to the other existing NICE guidelines for many comparable conditions

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A useful companion to our document is the paper ‘Overcoming Equality: Achieving Better Outcomes for Kidney Cancer’ published late 2019 by pharmaceutical company Bristol-Myers Squibb and endorsed by Kidney Cancer UK. You can download and read a copy of this report by clicking the image to the right.