Funded projects

To fund nurses to study palliative care

Attend course 'The significance of multidisciplinary teamwork in palliative care'

Clinical trial investigators attendance at Childrens' Oncology Group meeting in St Louis, USA

A sophisticated new endoscopic ultrasound (EUS) imaging facility is to be established at North Shore Hospital. EUS greatly improves the accuracy of diagnosis and staging of stomach and oesophageal cancer which results in improved treatment planning. This grant will allow a gastroenterologist to receive training in this new technology in Hong Kong.

This applicant has recently completed a PhD study designed to investigate and improve the management of breathlessness in cancer patients. A booklet based on this work that will help patients deal with cancer-associated breathlessness has been published by the Wellington Cancer Society and this grant will be used to develop support media comprising cassettes and CDs.

A group of cancer specialists has been working since 1999 to develop a Cancer Control Strategy aimed at reducing the incidence and impact of cancer in New Zealand. The strategy document will be released in mid 2003. The Cancer Control Trust is planning to run a workshop to ensure maximum participation by the many government and non-government agencies involved in cancer prevention, screening, treatment, support, palliative care and research. The grant from the Genesis Oncology Trust will be used to underwrite the cost of this workshop on the implementation of the New Zealand Cancer Control Strategy.

The Wellington Cancer Centre is part of an Australasian trial evaluating the use of 3D Conformal Radiation Treatment in the management of prostate cancer. A grant in aid from the trust will be used for overseas training for radiation therapists and to purchase a patient- immobilisation device.

This grant will be used to fund a key US speaker at the 2003 New Zealand Institute of Medical Radiation Technology Conference in Hamilton.

Having a cancerous breast lump taken out is usually followed by the removal of the lymph nodes from under the arms (axillary dissection) to safeguard against the cancer's spread. A side effect of axillary dissection may be lymphoedema, known to cause permanent swelling, numbness and loss of mobility in the arm. A sentinel node biopsy has the potential to single out affected nodes only, lessening the risk of lymphoedema. The Genesis Oncology Trust grant will be used to partly fund the New Zealand component of an Australasian multi-centre trial of sentinel node biopsy.

Stimulating the body's immune system to fight cancer has long been a goal of cancer research. The difficulty is teaching the body to recognise the cancer as 'foreign'. This project will examine the ability of a new cancer vaccine to stimulate a therapeutic anti-tumour immune response. The new vaccine consists of proteins isolated from tumours inserted into immune stimulatory particles.

Palliative care is rapidly developing into a specialist field. In order to provide the best quality of life for people in the final stages of cancer, specialist training is required. A grant from the Genesis Oncology Trust will be used to provide general medical practitioners with six months training in palliative care medicine at the Mary Potter Hospice in Wellington.

Approximately one third of deaths occur in rest homes and private hospitals and this study will explore the level of staffing, education, facilities and equipment available in these institutions to meet the specialised palliative needs of dying patients. The grant will be used to help identify deficits in resources available to the dying and barriers to supplying effective palliative care. This will enable interventions to be put in place to address the needs of dying patients and those who care for them.

Oncologists at the Wellington Cancer Centre have been using a modified combination drug regime to treat patients with advanced bowel cancer. The objective is to reduce the number of side effects while maintaining maximum therapeutic benefits. The grant will allow a retrospective study to determine whether this benefit is being achieved.

New Zealand has an acute shortage of medical physicists. The New Zealand branch of the Australasian College of Physical Scientists and Engineers in Medicine, in conjunction with the Clinical Training Agency, is developing a 5-year training programme for medical physicists. The trainee physicists (registrars) will be attached to a hospital for the five years. During the training the registrars are required to take a one year university MSc course (unpaid). Grants from the Genesis Oncology Trust will be used to provide scholarships for this part of the training.

Clinical-Grade Development of Personalised T-Cell Immunotherapy for Melanoma

We are developing a personalised T-cell therapy for cancer, designed specifically for an individual patient based on unique features of their tumour that can be targeted by their immune system. This will be the first therapy of its kind created for clinical use in New Zealand. We have already selected a first patient for potential treatment and analysed their tumour to identify cancer-specific molecules that may be recognised by immune cells.  We developed new methods to stimulate and grow a type of immune cell (T-cells) from blood that recognise one of these molecules. When infused back into the patient, these T-cells can attack cancer cells, especially when combined with an approved immunotherapy drug (anti-PD-1). However, before clinical use, we must demonstrate to NZ medicines regulators that we can manufacture this therapy safely and effectively.  This project will generate the data needed to confirm that we can reliably produce T-cells with preserved anti-cancer activity in our specialised clinical-grade laboratory and that the cells remain functional after preparation and storage for infusion. Success will enable regulatory approval for clinical trials of this personalised immunotherapy in New Zealanders with a range of cancers, using methods designed for affordability within the NZ health system.