ANGLE PLC (AIM:AGL, OTCQX:ANPCY, FRA:DWV) said its Parsortix liquid biopsy system has demonstrated the ability to isolate circulating tumour cells (CTCs) in three cancer studies at the Medical University of Vienna.
The studies in ovarian cancer, small cell lung cancer (SCLC) and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients all used Parsortix to isolate CTCs from a simple blood draw.
ANGLE said the studies demonstrate that CTC analysis before and during treatment can provide non-invasive monitoring of cancer patients throughout their treatment and that CTC gene expression profiles can determine progression free survival and response to therapy.
The largest study, a Phase II drug trial involving 133 ovarian cancer patients, explored longitudinal gene expression of CTCs isolated using the Parsortix system in platinum-resistant patients enrolled on the GANNET53 trial over a five-year period with an average four time points for each patient.
Analysis of genes expressed on CTCs isolated from successive blood draws correlated closely with significantly improved progression free survival and response to therapy, the company said. For example, at cycle 1, gene expression analysis of CTCs isolated by the Parsortix system could predict responders (with a survival rate of 85% at 120 days) compared to non-responders (with a survival rate of 30% at 120 days). This pattern was repeated at all the cycle points.
The study demonstrates how gene expression analysis of CTCs, isolated by the Parsortix system, can be used in pharma drug trials for longitudinal patient monitoring and to guide treatment selection, ANGLE said.
Ovarian cancer is associated with poor patient outcomes and there is a clear need for biomarkers which can support personalised medicine and track patient response to optimise the care pathway, it added.
In the NSCLC study, the gene expression analysed by qPCR of CTCs harvested by the Parsortix system was found to be more effective at predicting overall patient survival than assessing the presence of epithelial CTCs, the company said.
The three studies were presented by the Molecular Oncology Group at the Medical University of Vienna at the 5th Advances in Circulating Tumour Cells (ACTC) conference, held 22-25 September in Kalamata, Greece.
ANGLE founder and chief executive Andrew Newland said: “These studies, including data from a large multicentre European clinical trial, build on the growing body of evidence supporting the use of the Parsortix system to provide cancer cells for analysis from a simple blood test and to uncover potentially valuable new cancer biomarkers, with the potential to guide drug development and inform treatment decisions.”
