A unique partnership between Newcastle Hospitals and RareCan is playing a vital role in developing innovative treatments for rarer forms of cancer.
By connecting consenting patients with leading researchers, RareCan is pioneering a new platform which provides access to tissue and blood samples and genetic data from a large and growing patient community, with the aim of improving the prevention, diagnosis or treatment of rare cancers.
Through the partnership, scientists from Newcastle’s NovoPath laboratory use their expertise, specialist facilities and advanced techniques to prepare and store slides containing cancer samples, ready for further analysis by the researchers.
Rare cancers collectively affect more than 70,000 people each year in the UK, which is more than 1 in 5 of total cancer diagnoses. About two thirds will die from their disease within five years, compared with under half for those affected by common cancers.
Commenting on the partnership, Alastair Burt from NovoPath said:
“Through our specialist team and laboratory we provide a dedicated service to improve diagnostics and precision medicine, in particular for cancer treatment and with inflammatory diseases.
“In addition to providing high quality samples, NovoPath’s scientists can offer researchers access to services such as tissue micro arrays, DNA extraction and advanced imaging of tissue.
”We’re really excited about our partnership with RareCan and the role we’ll play in supporting patients and researchers across the whole of the UK.”
Andy Hall, chief scientific officer at RareCan, said:
“Access to samples is key to promoting new and better ways to prevent, diagnose and treat rare cancers. This partnership ensures these samples kindly donated by patients are processed using state of the art techniques to maximise their value.
“Researchers themselves can be assured of receiving expertly prepared samples to their specification, including important additional data such as digital images of stained slides.”
More media information from Julie Marsh on 07523 939346
Notes to editors
RareCan is a mission driven company with a purpose to accelerate research into rare cancers. RareCan is the first and only company using technology to bring together consenting patients, secure data, and bio-samples, enabling researchers to develop new and improved treatments for rare cancers, changing people’s lives. This is the future of clinical research. Find out more here: https://rarecan.com/
Follow RareCan on Twitter @RareCanUK and LinkedIn @RareCan
Novopath provides high quality and timely specialist technical services in tissue-based diagnostics, to researchers and academics, other healthcare providers and industry. Our vision is to improve health and well-being through the delivery, innovation and promotion of precision diagnostics for precision medicine.