Victorian cancer patients to access clinical trials

PATIENTS with some of the most aggressive and deadliest cancers will have access to clinical trials at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre due to $50 million in new funding.

MORE than 800 Victorian cancer patients will now have access to lifesaving clinical trials in Melbourne.

Many of the patients, who have some of the most aggressive and deadliest cancers, have been forced to travel to Sydney for the new DNA testing.

The tests collect samples which are then sequenced in a laboratory to identify the exact type of cancer they have and the treatment they need.

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Health Minister Greg Hunt will on Wednesday reveal that the 835 Victorians will now be able to undergo the genomic testing at the world-renowned Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre in Melbourne.

The federal government is to ­announce $50 million in new funding for the program, bringing its total commitment to $160 million over five years.

Mr Hunt said: “This world-leading treatment means Victorian patients can access lifesaving support without needing to travel interstate.

“This will help some of our sickest Victorian patients in their battle against cancer.”

The Federal Minister for Health Greg Hunt. Picture: AAP

Melbourne resident Deb Welch, who has been diagnosed with kidney cancer and now breast cancer, is among those who can undergo the DNA testing trial here.

It will be especially beneficial for her as a genetic mutation may be driving both cancers.

Ms Welch has been undergoing chemotherapy all year and is about to start radiation therapy.

She said she was looking forward to participating in the trials, to potentially be able to find out the exact type of drugs or treatment required to attack her cancers.

“It would just be amazing to go and do that and know exactly what kind of pathway to go down, rather than just running the gauntlet of chemotherapy and radiation,” she said. “I’ve been doing chemotherapy for five months and unfortunately, I have had reactions to a lot of the drugs.”

The new type of testing works by looking deep into each patient’s cancerous cells and analysing their DNA, to work out how to target and destroy the cancer.

Meanwhile, Australian researchers have developed a world-first blood test to detect melanoma.

Lead researcher Pauline Zaenker, of the Edith Cowan University’s melanoma research group, described the test as an “exciting” potential screening tool because it could pick up melanoma in the early stages when the condition was still treatable.

“Patients who have their melanoma detected in its early stage have a five-year survival rate between 90 and 99 per cent,” she said.

“Whereas if it is not caught early and it spreads around the body, the five-year survival rate among melanoma ­patients drops to less than 50 per cent,” she said.

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