The prospects of creating new diagnostic tests for practical oncology are becoming a reality due to the synergy between research companies and leading medical centers in Russia.

An example of such successful co-operation is the LUCARD project (Lung Cancer Residual Disease study). The project was successfully launched more than a year ago. National BioService, which initiated this study, provides general management and financing of the project, conducts a set of molecular genetic studies, and the Federal State Budgetary Institution “N.N. Blokhin National Research Center of Oncology ” of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation (N.N. Blokhin NMRCO) provides clinical support and work with patients.

The aim of the project is to develop a method for risk assessment and an early diagnosis of recurrence in patients with non-small cell lung cancer after radical surgical treatment. The main objective of this study is to develop a method to detect and assess the level of circulating tumour DNA in plasma after surgical tumour removal in operable stage II-IIIA non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). It is important to investigate whether the presence of tumour DNA in plasma can be used as a prognostic biomarker of disease recurrence. In addition, the study of tumour DNA characteristics may help practitioners to decide on the therapy tactics of the disease and evaluate its efficacy. Mutations in a panel of lung cancer-associated genes are analysed in patients’ tumour tissue. For each patient, somatic mutations are individually selected and included in the panel for analysis by NGS in pre- and post-operative plasma and at follow-up visits.

The successful start of the LUCARD project has inspired its participants to expand the study into the field of breast cancer. In 2022, a parallel project BECREDIS (Breast Cancer Residual Disease Study) was started, which aims to prove the feasibility of using circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA) determined during neoadjuvant therapy in patients diagnosed with breast cancer as a prognostic biomarker for recurrence and as a biomarker for dynamic monitoring of the malignancy status of the process. The study, as well as the previous one, is conducted by the National BioService company with the participation of such landmark research centres as N.N. Blokhin NMRCO and “St. Petersburg Clinical Scientific and Practical Centre for Specialised Medical Care (Oncological)”.

Similar studies, in the course of which scientists try to identify the risk group of possible recurrence of lung cancer and breast cancer, are now being actively conducted in the largest foreign oncological clinics in France, China, the USA and the UK. The intensity of these studies shows that the attempt to predict the development of recurrences of cancers diagnosed and operated on at early stages, with subsequent individualisation of treatment tactics, is the most modern trend in oncology and genetics.

If you would be interested in receiving information about the opportunity to join the above studies, please email info@nbioservice.com with the subject line “BECREDIS/LUCARD”.