NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) – Biocept said today that it has entered into a clinical collaboration with Sarah Cannon Research Institute in the area of breast cancer screening.
Specifically, the goal of the collaboration is to determine the clinical utility of using Biocept's OncoCEE technology to detect biomarkers in circulating tumor cell and circulating tumor DNA in blood samples from estrogen-positive breast cancer patients. The partners will also assess whether such biomarkers can help assess the response of tumors to treatment over time.
"The goal of our collaboration with Sarah Cannon is to identify biomarkers that can be evaluated through a simple blood draw, without continually performing tissue biopsies on a patient," Biocept Senior Vice President and Senior Medical Director Veena Singh said in a statement. "By using a blood sample to screen these patients, we seek to help more patients qualify for new drug therapies that can more effectively target cancer."
Sarah Cannon Research Institute is the research arm of Sarah Cannon, the global cancer enterprise of Hospital Corporation of America. The institute conducts community-based clinical trials in oncology and cardiology through affiliations with a network of more than 1,000 physicians in the US and UK.