Researchers at IMB have recently received the good news that EU’s Horizon Europe has awarded funding to the collaborative partnerships they are participating in. IMB’s strong research specialists in the field of big data and artificial intelligence will be assisting one of the projects entitled “Missions” (acronym PREDI-LYNCH).
– We will devise an efficient method of detecting cancer before it develops, or at an early stage of development, in patients with Lynch syndrome. I am delighted to be contributing to this project because it poses a methodological challenge in the field of artificial intelligence and because we will be able to see the effect of our work directly in the patients, says Arnoldo Frigessi, professor of Biostatistics at the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences.
Patients with Lynch syndrome (LS) have a genetic defect that increases the risk of developing cancer in the colon, rectum, stomach, uterus, pancreas, bladder, brain and many other tissues. Their risk of developing cancer of the colon is around 80 per cent.
Young people suffer from other health problems after surviving cancer
Hanne Cathrine Lie is associate professor at the Department of Behavioural Medicine at the same institute. For a number of years, she has carried out research on children and young adults who have survived cancer. She has for example worked to develop a digital tool to help young people who have had cancer.
In contrast to the the follow-up care of people who have had cancer in childhood, there hasn’t been a dedicated system for following up patients who get cancer in young adulthood. There is typically a more general system in use, irrespective of whether you are 30 or 70 years old.
– You are at a completely different stage in your life if you are diagnosed with cancer before you are 40 than later on in terms of educational and career achievements, starting your own family etc. Moreover, when treated as a young adult, the cancer and it’s treatment place you at risk of other health issues, so called late effects, than if you are older. These can have ongoing impact on your everyday life in many ways, says Lie.
– That’s why providing ongoing follow-up care beyond treatment completion is important, to ensure best possible health and quality of life outcomes for the survivors.
Will test a new follow-up programme on 1000 young adults in eleven countries
The new project that has been awarded funding from EU’s Horizon Europe, “Global Challenge” (acronym PanCare4AYA), will develop a new programme for follow up young adults. The programme will be adapted to, and tested on, 1000 survivors of young adult cancers in eleven countries, including Norway. The associate professor is a partner in the project whose application was submitted, and is led, by the Princess Máxima Center for Pediatric Oncology in the Netherlands, with a number of other European institutions also involved.
– Oslo University Hospital will be testing the new programme on Norwegian patients, while I will be participating in designing the research methods and outcome measures used in the study, including quality of life and patient satisfaction, in addition to clinical outcome measures, she says.
Glad for the funding
The Head of IMB, Philippe Collas is delighted about the new grants.
– This is very good news. Frigessi and Lie represent strong research environments at our institute and have a lot to contribute now that a large number of scientists in Europe are collaborating to solve these two challenges, he says.
The hunt for biomarkers
In Frigessi’s project, Oslo University Hospital is the main player, with many European institutions also on the team. Professor Frigessi explains that they will use AI for machine learning to analyse tissue samples and other material with the aim of detecting signs of so-called biomarkers. Biomarkers are substances or molecules that can be measured or detected in the body or in a cell and that can reveal something about an underlying condition or disorder.
– Our aim is to devise a method that is accurate and cost-effective, without the need to intervene in tissue or pierce the skin. The method will also be capable of detecting many different kinds of cancer. This is important because research on LS has been underfunded in the past and this has led to inequalities of health and preventive care for this group of patients, he says.
A significant project
Biostatisticians are constantly being asked to use their expertise on projects involving big data and artificial intelligence, but Frigessi regards this project as particularly significant:
– LS is a very particular condition that results in problems and challenges that up until now have remained unsolved in my field of research.
Frigessi currently leads a Centre for Excellence in research, Integreat, where IMB is a major partner.
– We are very interested in taking real-world problems and finding ways of solving them in better ways with the help of knowledge-driven machine learning, he says.
Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Health and Digital Executive Agency (HaDEA). Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.
