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Strata Oncology, Epizyme Partner to Pick Cancer Patients for Drug Trial

NEW YORK (GenomeWeb) — Strata Oncology announced today that it has agreed to help Epizyme identify patients for enrollment in a clinical study of its non-Hodgkins lymphoma (NHL) drug tazemetostat.

Epizyme's tazemetostat is an oral inhibitor of EZH2 being developed for a number of cancer indications, including relapsed or refractory NHL. Under the terms of the deal, Strata will identify NHL patients whose tumors have EZH2-activating mutations in its Strata Trial — an observational study in which up to 100,000 patients with advanced cancers will receive no-cost tumor sequencing and clinical trial matching — for possible enrollment in an ongoing Phase II study of the drug.

"This collaboration with Epizyme exemplifies Strata's commitment to selecting the most promising precision medicine programs for our portfolio of pharma-sponsored trials," Strata CEO Dan Rhodes said in a statement. "The addition of tazemetostat to Strata's growing portfolio of programs furthers our goal of providing cancer patients with greater access to clinical trials specific to their cancer type."

Earlier this month, Strata began working with Clovis Oncology to help identify prostate cancer patients for enrollment in a trial of the PARP inhibitor rucaparib.

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