Breast Cancer Research Boosted by $250,000

Breast Cancer Research Boosted by $250,000

Research projects from some of New Zealand’s best clinicians and researchers have been boosted by substantial grants from The New Zealand Breast Cancer Foundation. Grants are reviewed and awarded by The Foundation's Medical Advisory Committee and Board of Trustees. The Medical Advisory Committee is chaired by Breast Surgeon, Dr Belinda Scott, and includes clinicians and researchers across a wide variety of breast cancer disciplines.

Dr Scott says she was overwhelmed at the number of applications received and the exciting range of research projects proposed for scientific investigation.

“While some organizations struggle to find research projects to fund, we are delighted to have the opposite problem and are pleased to have been able to increase our financial support by an additional $200,000 for 2009”, she says.

The Foundation received eleven high quality applications from NZ universities, NZ District Health Boards (DHBs) and NZ-based research companies, and is pleased to provide funding for four of these research proposals, in addition to a second year of $50,000 funding to Dr Euphemia Leung of The University of Auckland.

Dr Leung’s research focuses on early detection of resistance to the anti-estrogen drug Tamoxifen so as to provide opportunity for early intervention with alternative treatments for breast cancer patients. The outcome of this research could make a significant contribution in improving patient survival.

Another research project investigates causes of breast cancer drug resistance, such as Tamoxifen, has received an NZBCF grant of $73,000 and is led by Dr Michael Black from The University of Otago. Dr Black’s and colleague, Dr Sarah Song’s research will use a unique resource of carefully processed publicly available breast tumour data collected from thousands of women all over the world, in combination with genomic information from hundreds of cancer-cell lines. This data will be used to identify those DNA changes that are associated with drug resistance and therefore drive breast cancer disease progression.

NZBCF Research Analyst, Valerie Pennick described this research as very promising and highly achievable. “From a treatment potential, if this research is successful, it will help to provide targeted treatment for patients whose disease has continued to progress while on conventional therapy”, she says.

Breast cancer which has spread to other sites is still largely an incurable disease despite major therapeutic advances including anti-hormone-based drugs which sometimes delay cancer relapse rather than provide an effective cure.

Dr Geoff Krissansen in the Department of Molecular Medicine and Pathology at The University of Auckland is receiving Foundation funding of $45,000 and his innovative research may provide the missing link to a cure. His study proposes to enhance hormonal therapies for breast cancer using a beneficial agent called lactoferrin which is part of the body’s defence system.

Laboratory medicine has seen an increasing variety of techniques available for clinicians to use in predicting breast cancer survival and risk of recurrence. These more sophisticated analytical tools such as fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH). A FISH microarray is one of the new advances in tumour genetics and is being used to assess biological behaviour. This technique examines hundreds/thousands of strands of DNA/RNA or protein from the tumour and is able to determine the relative quantities (loss or gain) of these elements and then assess the relative likelihood of survival or response to various therapies.

Regrettably, the FISH test is expensive and once a particular technique is patented, it cannot be reproduced in other laboratories. A new research project by Dr Paul Oei of IGENZ Ltd and Dr Reena Ramsaroop of Diagnostic Medlab in Auckland aims to develop a simple, reproducible, routine clinical laboratory FISH test which uses a new set of immunogenic (disease fighting) and genetic markers which predict survival and risk of recurrence of breast cancer in NZ. The NZBCF Grant for this research project is $60,000.

Valerie Pennick says that this proposal is potentially very exciting. “It means that New Zealand clinicians could possibly patent and provide a highly effective prognostic test at a quarter of the cost of the existing overseas tests. But most importantly, this research project has the potential to increase the survival of those NZ women diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer“, she says.

The fifth research project to receive grant funding from The NZBCF in 2009 is a comparison of treatment choices and outcomes for rural and urban women in New Zealand who have been diagnosed with breast cancer. This research has been granted funding for two years: $46,000 Year 1 (2009) and $17,000 Year 2 (2010) and is the project of Associate Professor Susan Dovey at the Dunedin School of Medicine, The University of Otago.

Overseas research suggests that the treatment choices made by rural women diagnosed with breast cancer impacts on their long term survival. For example, some rural women chose more extensive surgical therapies than urban women, and treatments such as radiation therapy, were less likely to be chosen because of pragmatic challenges such as travel time.

Associate Professor Dovey’s research aims to determine whether rural and urban women in Otago and Southland have different treatment for breast cancer and to establish the reasons rural women with breast cancer opt for the treatment choices they do.

Executive Trustee of the NZBCF, Heather Shotter is pleased to be able to fund this original and much needed study. “This research meets NZBCF’s mandate to improve survival for NZ’s rural/remote women diagnosed with breast cancer. By understanding the reasons rural women make the treatment decisions they do, hopefully in the future, it will increase their survival in both physical and psychosocial contexts”, she says.

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The increase in funding for Research is part of The Foundation’s three year strategy to expand services and programmes to advance the NZ five year survival rate of breast cancer, and improve the quality of life for New Zealanders affected by this disease.

Executive Trustee, Heather Shotter says that “research into improved treatments for breast cancer is critically important for those affected. While all of us hope that a cure for breast cancer is on the horizon, it is only through research that we will find it”.

To date, The New Zealand Breast Cancer Foundation has distributed well over $1,000,000 for breast cancer research and medical grants in New Zealand.

ENDS

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