Breakthrough Breast Cancer Funds Doctor To Forward Cutting-Edge Breast Cancer Research

Main Category: Breast Cancer
Also Included In: Cancer / Oncology
Article Date: 02 Oct 2008 - 5:00 PDT

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A new research fellowship programme by the UK's leading breast cancer charity, Breakthrough Breast Cancer, has awarded its first grant of over £900,000 to allow an oncologist to establish a laboratory to undertake vital research into HER2 positive breast cancer. Dr Anthony Kong, who helps treat breast cancer patients within the Oxford Radcliffe NHS Trust, is the first clinician scientist to be funded through Breakthrough Breast Cancer's Clinical Researcher Programme which aims to bridge the gap between basic science and the patient - a two-way 'bench to bedside' approach that will deliver real benefit to patients.

HER2 positive breast cancer accounts for around 1 in 5 of the 46,000 breast cancers diagnosed in the UK each year. Herceptin is a key treatment for this type of the disease but not all patients benefit from this drug. Although doctors can confirm that a cancer is HER2 positive using immunohistochemistry or a technique called FISH, there is currently no reliable test to predict whether Herceptin will be effective for every patient. Dr Kong will use a state-of-the-art microscopy technique called FRET with the aim of validating this as a new prognostic tool to predict whether a patient is likely to benefit from Herceptin as well as identify patients who are likely to relapse. He aims to use this technique to classify breast cancers on the activation and dimerisation state of HER2 receptors and relate this to gene expression profiles. By doing so he believes this will be useful in selecting patients who are not considered to have HER2 positive breast cancer under current tests and yet may still benefit from Herceptin. Furthermore, this method may also be useful in the future to predict whether patients would benefit from other targeted treatments that may become available.

Dr Anthony Kong will establish his research laboratory at the Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine under the supervision of Professor Adrian Harris, Director of the Molecular Oncology Laboratories at the Institute. Alongside this research project, Dr Kong will continue his clinical commitments alongside Dr Bernadette Lavery, Professor Adrian Harris and other oncologists within the Oxford Radcliffe NHS Trust.

Dr Kong says: "I am delighted to receive funding for my research from Breakthrough Breast Cancer's Clinical Researcher Programme. This funding will not only enable me to investigate ways to treat patients more effectively, but will also help me translate my findings into direct benefits for patients more quickly, which I feel is absolutely essential. By taking this approach, my research will help to make a real difference to women with breast cancer and their families."

Dr Anthony Kong's studies will complement work already taking place at the internationally renowned Breakthrough Toby Robins Breast Cancer Research Centre housed in the Mary-Jean Mitchell Green building at The Institute of Cancer Research in London.

Breakthrough Breast Cancer needs to raise at least £25 million each year for the next three years to support its vital research, campaigning and education work. For more information about the charity, please visit http://www.breakthrough.org.uk.

Notes

- Dr Anthony Kong has been awarded £919,548 from Breakthrough Breast Cancer's Clinical Researcher Programme to undertake pioneering breast cancer research

- Dr Kong's research will focus on HER2 positive breast cancer. Doctors determine whether a woman has this type of breast cancer by testing her tumour cells for high levels of the HER2 protein. HER2 becomes activated when it links together with another molecule and it is this activated form of the protein that can help cancer cells to grow.

- Doctors can confirm that a cancer is HER2 positive using immunohistochemistry or a technique called FISH (fluorescence in situ hybridization). This uses fluorescein tags that bind to specific chromosome regions. These tags glow under ultraviolet light and can be useful for identifying chromosomal abnormalities.

- There is currently no reliable test to predict whether Herceptin will be effective for every patient. Dr Kong's work will involve using the technique FRET (Förster Resonance Energy Transfer), which can measure extremely small distances between molecules. Using this technique, scientists can tell whether molecules are linked together or not, and therefore, whether they are active.

- Dr Anthony Kong hopes to use FRET to find out whether the HER2 protein in patients tumours is active. If it is, it is an excellent indicator that the woman will benefit from receiving Herceptin, or a similar targeted therapy. He also hopes to use the FRET technique to discover why some breast cancers are resistant to targeted treatments like Herceptin. This is vital work which should help doctors to precisely match each patient with the treatment most likely to be effective for them.

- Dr Anthony Kong graduated from Barts and The London School of Medicine in 1997, taking the Sutton Prize in pathology and the ARC Prize in rheumatology. Following his specialist training in clinical oncology at Barts, Dr Kong passed the fellowship exam of the Royal College of Radiologists in 2004 and was honoured with the prestigious Rohan Williams gold medal. He then undertook a PhD before resuming his specialist training at the Royal Marsden Hospital in London in September 2007. Dr Kong has received numerous prizes and awards for his research and aims to build an academic career in clinical oncology, combining his translational research in breast cancer with his clinical work as well as conducting clinical trials.

- The Breakthrough Clinical Researcher Programme aims to support talented clinical researchers committed to improving clinical practice through innovative translational research. This fellowship programme is designed for individuals who are dedicated to a career in clinical academic medicine and who intend to become future research leaders.

Breakthrough Breast Cancer

- Breakthrough Breast Cancer is the UK's leading breast cancer charity committed to fighting breast cancer through research, campaigning and education. In 1999 Breakthrough established the UK's first dedicated breast cancer research centre. The Breakthrough Toby Robins Breast Cancer Research Centre is housed in the Mary-Jean Mitchell Green building at The Institute of Cancer Research and was set up in association with the Royal Marsden Hospital.

- Under the directorship of Professor Alan Ashworth, the Breakthrough Research Centre now has 120 world-class scientists and clinicians tackling breast cancer from all angles - from understanding the normal growth and development of the breast, how breast cancer arises and how the cancer spreads, to treatment and ultimately disease prevention. Scientists at the Breakthrough Research Centre have a range of expertise and approaches and together they are working towards a common goal: a future free from the fear of breast cancer.

- Breakthrough Breast Cancer is opening three new research units in Edinburgh, London and Manchester during 2008. The Breakthrough Breast Cancer Research Unit at The University of Edinburgh will aim to improve and develop treatments for hormone positive breast cancer. The Breakthrough Breast Cancer Research Unit at King's College London will investigate a poorly understood type of breast cancer called basal-like breast cancer, which is more common among young women and those of African origin. The Breakthrough Breast Cancer Research Unit at The University of Manchester will focus on developing new ways to detect and prevent early breast cancer

Breast cancer

- Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in the UK -- nearly 46,000 women and around 300 men are diagnosed every year.

- Breast cancer accounts for nearly 1 in 3 of all female cancers and one in nine women in the UK will develop breast cancer at some point in their lifetime.

- The good news is that more women than ever in the UK are surviving breast cancer thanks to better awareness, better treatments and better screening.

Breakthrough Breast Cancer