Cancer Research Charities Research Articles

158 Evaluation of a multi-modal rehabilitation programme for people affected by cancer: the Active Together service

Abstract Purpose Rehabilitation (including prehabilitation) can help cancer patients prepare for and recover well from treatment, improve physical and psychological outcomes, and reduce demand on healthcare resources. Project description Active Together is a novel evidence-based multi-modal rehabilitation service for patients with cancer before, during and after their treatment. It was developed collaboratively by Sheffield Hallam University’s Advanced Wellbeing Research Centre (AWRC) and Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust and funded by Yorkshire Cancer Research charity. The service is personalised to individual needs and includes exercise, nutrition, and psychological support. The service is delivered by a clinical team combining physiotherapists, exercise specialists, dietitians, and clinical psychologists at the AWRC and two community health and exercise facilities, with plans to extend to more sites as the service expands. Since launching in 2022, over 600 patients with either lung, colorectal, or upper gastrointestinal cancer have received support from the Active Together service. The evaluation of the service examines physical and psychological outcomes, alongside healthcare resource use. Service uptake and attrition rates will be examined by demographics such as age, gender, and ethnicity. The evaluation is due be completed in August 2024; therefore, the results will be available for this presentation. Conclusions The evaluation of this service will assess the feasibility and effectiveness of the Active Together Service in improving the lives of cancer patients, and addressing the health inequalities and barriers which may prevent someone from accessing the Active Together service. If the evaluation produces positive outcomes, it will support the case for embedding multimodal rehabilitation services within routine cancer care. Funding The Active Together service is funded by Yorkshire Cancer Research.

Acidosis Significantly Alters Immune Checkpoint Expression Profiles of T Cells

Tumour acidosis contributes to cancer progression by inhibiting anti-tumour immunity. However, the effect of acidosis on anti-tumour T cell phenotypes in oesophageal adenocarcinoma (OAC) is unknown. Therefore, this study investigated the effect of acidosis on anti-tumour T cell profiles and if immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) could enhance anti-tumour T cell immunity under acidosis. Acidic conditions substantially altered immune checkpoint expression profiles of OAC patient-derived T cells, upregulating TIM-3, LAG-3 and CTLA-4. Severe acidosis (pH 5.5) significantly decreased the percentage of central memory CD4 + T cells, an effect that was attenuated by ICB treatment. ICB increased T cell production of IFN-γ under moderate acidosis (pH 6.6) but not severe acidosis (pH 5.5) and decreased IL-10 production by T cells under severe acidic conditions only. A link between lactate and promotion of angiogenesis was also depicted; circulating lactate levels positively correlated with circulating soluble Tie-2. Our findings establish that acidosis-induced upregulation of immune checkpoints on T cells may potentially contribute to immune evasion in OAC. However, acidic conditions curtailed ICB efficacy, supporting a rationale for utilizing systemic oral buffers to neutralize tumour acidity to improve ICB efficacy. Funding: This work was funded by an Irish Research Council scholarship (GOIPG/2017/1659) and the CROSS cancer research charity. Declaration of Interest: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest Ethical Approval: Ethical approval was granted from the St James’s Hospital Ethics Committee.

MP18-03 TUMOR-INFILTRATING CD39+CD8+ T CELLS DETERMINE POOR PROGNOSIS AND IMMUNE EVASION IN CLEAR-CELL RENAL CELL CARCINOMA PATIENTS

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVE: Tumor microenvironment is important in the progression of Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) and its prognostic value is still unclear. Recent reports demonstrated Tumor-infiltrating CD39+CD8+ T cells are abundant, but their function remains obscure.In this study, we want to assess clinical value of CD39+CD8+ T cells and seek a potential therapeutic target in ccRCC METHODS: Two Zhongshan Hospital cohorts (ZSHC) contained 243 non-metastatic ccRCC patients who underwent nephrectomy and 85 metastatic ccRCC patients treated by tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs). In vitro, fresh tumor tissues from another 48 ccRCC patients were used to assess the potential therapeutic worth of the CD39 inhibitor. Immune cell functions were analyzed by flow cytometry. Kaplan–Meier analysis and COX regression model were applied for survival analyses RESULTS: We found that accumulation of CD39+CD8+ T cells indicated poor prognosis (p<0.0001). But high CD39+CD8+ T cells indicated therapeutic benefit of TKIs therapy (p=0.015). CD39+CD8+ T cells showed decreased TNF-α and IFN-γ with elevated PD-1 and TIM-3 expression. Further analysis of tumor-infiltrating immune cell landscape in the ccRCC revealed the positive correlation between CD39+CD8+ T cells and Tregs (p=0.037) and M2-polarized macrophages (p<0.0001). Finally, inhibition of CD39 partially restores the antitumor function of CD8+ T cells. Study limitation includes the unclear impacts of CD39 in vivo. CONCLUSIONS: High CD39+CD8+ T cells indicated poor prognosis in ccRCC, due to impaired antitumor function of CD39+CD8+ T cells. Thus, CD39 is a promising target for immunotherapy in ccRCCSource of Funding: This study was funded by grants from National Natural Science Foundation of China (81671628, 31770851, 81702496, 81702497, 81702805, 81772696, 81871306, 81872082), Shanghai Municipal Natural Science Foundation (16ZR1406500), Guide Project of Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (17411963100), Shanghai Sailing Program (18YF1404500, 19YF1407900, 19YF1427200), Shanghai Municipal Commission of Health and Family Planning Program (20174Y0042, 201840168, 20184Y0151), Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center for Outstanding Youth Scholars Foundation (YJYQ201802) and Shanghai Cancer Research Charity Center. All these study sponsors have no roles in the study design, in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data.

Leading cancer-research charity takes tough stance on bullying

Cancer Research UK will be able to revoke grants if researchers and institutions do not abide by its new behaviour policy. Cancer Research UK will be able to revoke grants if researchers and institutions do not abide by its new behaviour policy.

905P - CD103+ tissue-resident CD8+ T Cells correlate with protective anti-tumoral immune responses in muscle-invasive bladder cancer patients

Background: CD103+ Tissue-resident CD8+ T cells are previously reported as memory CD8+ T cells and thus could promote adaptive immune response. While immunotherapy shows a great potential in muscle-invasive bladder cancer (MIBC) treatment, it is urgent to discover which subgroup MIBC patients could benefit most from immunotherapy. We here tried to explore the prognostic and predictive value of CD103+ tissue-resident CD8+ T cells, and provide possible molecular explanations. Methods: We selected 259 MIBC patients who underwent radical cystectomy between 2002 and 2014. CD103+ tissue-resident CD8+ T Cells were evaluated via immunofluorescence of CD103 and CD8 performed in our constructed tissue microarrays. Prognostic value of CD103+ CD8+ T cells in MIBC was assessed, and was further validated in TCGA-BLCA cohort using tissue-resident CD8+ T cell core signatures. 10 fresh MIBC specimens were analyzed by flow cytometry to explore the anti-tumoral immune response and immune check-point expression of tissue-resident CD8+ T cell. Results: Patients with higher CD103+ tissue-resident CD8+ T cells infiltration had a significant better overall survival in both our study population and TCGA-BLCA cohort (HR = 0.504, 95%CI: 0.312-0.816; P = 0.005 and HR = 0.637, 95%CI: 0.444-0.913; P = 0.014). Further Cox regression indicated that CD103+ tissue-resident CD8+ T cells was an independent prognosticator in MIBC patients. Flow cytometry results revealed that CD103+ CD8+ T cells tended to express more IFN-γ and granzyme B than CD103- CD8+ T cells (P < 0.001 and P = 0.007, respectively) (n = 10). However, expression of perforin did not show significant differences between CD103+ CD8+ T cells and CD103- CD8+ T cells. We then analyzed PD-L1 and TIM3 expression in CD103+ tissue-resident CD8+ T cells. Surprisingly, there was no significant differences of PD-L1 expression between CD103+ CD8+ T cells and CD103- CD8+ T cells. Nonetheless, CD103+ CD8+ T cells had more TIM3+ phenotypes than CD103- CD8+ T cells (P = 0.034). Conclusions: High CD103+ tissue-resident CD8+ T cells could predict better prognosis in MIBC patients. Patients with high infiltration of CD103+ tissue-resident CD8+ T cells might benefit most from anti-TIM3 immunotherapy. Legal entity responsible for the study: Dai, Bo. Funding: National Natural Science Foundation of China; Shanghai Municipal Natural Science Foundation; Shanghai Municipal Commission of Health and Family Planning Program; Guide Project of Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality; Shanghai Cancer Research Charity Center. Disclosure: All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.

The way forward at Diabetes UK

Introduction To start with a brief introduction, I succeeded Barbara Young as Chief Executive of Diabetes UK last September, arriving from breast cancer research and support charity, Breakthrough Breast Cancer, where I had worked for eight years, initially as Director of Fundraising and then as Chief Executive, leading charity into a merger with a smaller breast cancer charity to form Breast Cancer Now. Before that, I held an interim role at JDRF, which marked my entry into health sector. Since arriving at Diabetes UK, I have understood immense challenges of diabetes, at an individual and system level, but also unique opportunity offered by broader recognition of these challenges by politicians, health service leaders, healthcare professionals, people with diabetes, public and media. Our recent news release that numbers of people with diabetes in UK population has topped 4 million for first time attracted huge attention. Public debate around addressing our obesogenic environment appears to be coalescing to a consensus that now is time to take action. The National Diabetes Prevention Programme should be acknowledged as a first nation-wide investment in applying evidence to prevent growing tide of Type 2 diabetes and it is right that Diabetes UK is central in driving this work forward. But there is much more yet to achieve. The findings of November’s National Audit Office report on adult diabetes services, re-emphasised in a Public Accounts Committee’s review earlier this year, make for a sobering read; whilst there's been progress in lowering additional risk of death from diabetes (in truth, a change which has come about as a result of improvements in delivering nine recommended care processes and achieving three treatment standards in late 90s and early 2000s), there is little progress reported in other key areas since initial report of 2012. In words of report itself significant geographic variations persist in quality of care for people with diabetes and in their outcomes..., groups of diabetes patients, such as patients with Type 1 diabetes, receive worse routine care and have poorer outcomes...., the percentage of hospital beds occupied by diabetes patients is increasing but levels of diabetes specialist staff have not changed..., current payment mechanisms within NHS are not offering incentives to integrate diabetes care ...., few people with diabetes are recorded as receiving patient education.... The more recent National Diabetes Audit looks set to report improved blood pressure across Type 1 and Type 2, but highlights lowest level of completion of eight care processes, since at least 2009, at 38.7% and 58.7% for Type 1 and Type 2 respectively. I know that these issues concern us all hugely; I feel strongly that Diabetes UK’s role, alongside highlighting problems, is to work in partnership with specialists and others in system, to develop effective solutions that help to change picture for diabetes care. In this article I want to highlight some of key challenges that stand out from my initial conversations with diabetologists and to outline some of work that can help us, together, to grasp opportunities to improve diabetes care.

Government and charity funding of cancer research: public preferences and choices.

BackgroundIt is unclear how the public would respond to changes in government decisions about how much to spend on medical research in total and specifically on major disease areas such as cancer. Our aim was to elicit the views of the general public in the United Kingdom about how a change in government spending on cancer research might affect their willingness to donate, or to hypothecate a portion of their income tax payments, to cancer research charities.MethodsA web-based stated preference survey was conducted in 2013. Respondents considered hypothetical scenarios regarding changes in the levels of government funding for medical research. In each scenario, respondents were asked to imagine that they could allocate £100 of the income tax they paid this year to one or more medical research charities. They were asked how they wished to allocate the £100 between cancer research charities and medical research charities concerned with diseases other than cancer. After having been given the opportunity to allocate £100 in this way, respondents were then asked if they would want to reduce or increase any personal out-of-pocket donations that they already make to cancer research and non-cancer medical research charities. Descriptive analyses and random effects modelling were used to examine patterns in the response data.ResultsThe general tendency of respondents was to act to offset hypothetical changes in government spending. When asked to imagine that the government had reduced (or increased) its spending on cancer research, the general tendency of respondents was to state that they would give a larger (or smaller) allocation of their income tax to cancer research charities, and to increase (or reduce) their personal out-of-pocket donations to cancer research charities. However, most respondents’ preferred allocation splits and changes in personal donations did not vary much from scenario to scenario. Many of the differences between scenarios were small and non-significant.ConclusionsThe public’s decisions about how much to donate to cancer research or other medical research charities are not greatly affected by (hypothetical) changes to government plans about the amount of public funding of cancer or other medical research.

P180. Audit of referrals to a family history clinic

P180. Audit of referrals to a family history clinic

P181. Integration of physical activity into breast cancer care pathway “Can-Move” programme

P181. Integration of physical activity into breast cancer care pathway “Can-Move” programme

Referral Incentives in Crowdfunding

Word-of-mouth, referral, or viral marketing is a highly sought-after way of advertising. In this paper, we investigate whether such marketing can be encouraged through incentive mechanisms, thus allowing an organisation to effectively crowdsource their marketing. Specifically, we undertake a field experiment that compares several mechanisms for incentivising social media shares in support of a charitable cause. Our experiment takes place on a website promoting a fundraising drive by a large cancer research charity. Site visitors who sign up to support the cause are asked to spread the word about it on Facebook, Twitter or other channels. They are randomly assigned to one of four treatments that differ in the way social sharing activities are incentivised. Under the control treatment, no extra incentive is provided. Under two of the other mechanisms, the sharers are offered a fixed number of points that help take the campaign further. We compare low and high levels of such incentives for direct referrals. In the final treatment, we adopt a multi-level incentive mechanism that rewards direct as well as indirect referrals (where referred contacts refer others). We find that providing a high level of incentives results in a statistically significant increase in sharing behaviour and resulting signups. Our data does not indicate a statistically significant increase for the low and multi-level incentive mechanisms.

Referral Incentives in Crowdfunding

Word-of-mouth, referral, or viral marketing is a highly sought-after way of advertising. We undertake a field experiment that compares incentive mechanisms for encouraging social media shares to support a given cause. Our experiment takes place on a website set up to promote a fundraising drive by a large cancer research charity. Site visitors who choose to sign up to support the cause are then asked to spread the word about the cause on Facebook, Twitter or other channels. Visitors are randomly assigned to one of four treatments that differ in the way social sharing activities are incentivised. Under the control treatment, no extra incentive is provided. Under two of the other mechanisms, the sharers are offered a fixed number of points that help take the campaign further.We compare low and high levels of such incentives for direct referrals. In the final treatment, we adopt a multi-level incentive mechanism that rewards direct as well as indirect referrals (where referred contacts refer others). We find that providing high level of incentives results in a statistically significant increase in sharing behaviour and resulting signups. Our data does not indicate a statistically significant increase for the low and recursive incentive mechanisms.

Molecular radiotherapy — the radionuclide raffle?

Molecular radiotherapy — the radionuclide raffle?

How do the media report cancer research? A study of the UK's BBC website

This study examined cancer research stories on the BBC web archive (July 1998–June 2006). There were about 260 BBC stories per year, of which about 170 were classed as relevant to reports of cancer research. The stories focused heavily on breast cancer, and over one-third of them mentioned this (compared with a cancer disease burden of 13%); the next most covered sites were lung and prostate cancers, although the former was much less mentioned than its cancer disease burden of almost 20% would have suggested. The focus of the stories was often on new or improved drugs or vaccines (20% of stories), with lifestyle choices (12%), genetic developments (9%), and food and drink (8%) also featuring fairly prominently. The BBC stories cited about 1380 research papers that could be identified as journal articles. About three-quarters of the cited papers were in the field of cancer. The papers of these authors came from over 60 countries, and 40% were from the United Kingdom and 36% from the United States. UK cancer research was heavily overcited, by about 6:1, relative to its presence in world oncology research and US research was cited about in proportion. That of most other countries, especially Japan, Germany, and Austria, was relatively undercited. These cited papers also acknowledged more funding bodies. Most of the BBC stories were put in context by external commentators, of whom the large majority was from the UK's cancer research charities.

Liam O'Toole—Director of the UK National Cancer Research Institute

Liam O’ Toole: The NCRI is a partnership between the government, the government agencies that fund cancer, cancer research charities in the UK, and the pharmaceutical industry. It’s aims are to maintain the broad focus of cancer research in the UK, to identify gaps and opportunities for research, and to develop partnerships between the different funding organisations to plug those gaps. We plan to realise those opportunities as soon as possible and monitor progress in key areas over a longer period of time. TLO: How did you come to be doing this role?

In Brief

The UK's two prime cancer research charities – the Imperial Cancer Research Fund (ICRF) and the Cancer Research Campaign (CRC) – are merging into what will become the biggest independent cancer research organization in the world: Cancer Research UK (CRUK), effective February 2002. The new organization will combine CRC's strong translational research programme with world-class basic cancer research at the ICRF. The joint forces mount up to 3000 researchers and doctors with a research budget of £130 million a year. Andrew Miller, a biophysicist and former principal and vice chancellor of the University of Stirling, has been appointed as Interim Chief Executive and will mainly focus on the task of integrating the two organizations. Meanwhile, ICRF director general Paul Nurse acts as director of science at CRUK, and CRC director general Gordon McVie will be in charge of fundraising and communications. The funding model of the new charity will be styled after the US National Cancer Institute: about 50% will be spent in universities, and 50% in present labs. In an interview with BioMedNet, Miller said: ‘To have things all together in one building such as in Lincoln's Inn Fields has huge benefits. Different people meet over coffee or in the canteen. It's very powerful there, but we are ignoring a lot of people on the outside.’ The launch of CRUK coincided with the presentation of the Nobel Prize for Medicine to Paul Nurse for his pioneering work on the understanding of cell-cycle regulation. The 100th Nobel Prize was awarded jointly with Tim Hunt, also of the ICRF, and Leland Hartwell (of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center Seattle, USA). Links: http://www.crc.org.uk; http://www.icnet.uk J.d.B. & D.S.

Cancer Research UK looks to NCI forsuccess

This month sees the merging of the UK's two largest cancer research charities to form a national organization that will include some inspiration from across the Atlantic.

Major UK cancer research charities to consider merger.

Major UK cancer research charities to consider merger.

Exploring an alternative direct mail fundraising approach for a cancer research charity: a case study

AbstractThe Association for International Cancer Research (AICR) successfully uses sweepstakes techniques to generate funds to support cancer research projects. These methods have taken AICR to the top 80 of UK charities, in terms of gross voluntary income. It is recognised, however, that this approach only motivates one constituency of potential supporters among the population. Recently AICR tested an alternative approach, designed to appeal to a different constituency of support. This paper summarises the thinking behind the trial programme and presents some of the initial findings. It also considers the fulfilment requirements and how they were addressed. Copyright © 1999 Henry Stewart Publications

Development of the role of the out-patient tenovus support nurse in head and neck cancer care

The Tenovus Cancer Information Centre (TCIC) is a sister charity to the internationally renowned cancer research charity Tenovus and offers a national Freephone cancer helpline 365 days a year. The helpline is manned by experienced cancer nurses who will give information and support to patients with cancer, carers, the general public and health personnel. The charity also employs its own team of social workers, and offers a counselling service. Since 1992, Tenovus Support Nurses (TSNs) have been offering information and support services from bases in a number of cancer clinics in South East Wales (and other locations in the UK), supported by charitable funds. The contact with the patient and family in the out-patient clinic may simply involve an introduction by the nurse about the role of the TCIC, and the giving of a card with the helpline number on it. More commonly, immediate time and privacy is provided to enable the patient and their family to discuss their questions, problems and fears. The introduction of a TSN into a particular clinic is by mutual agreement with hospital management, clinical staff and Tenovus themselves. For the TSN working in oncology clinics, this new role represents a departure from their other work of manning the helpline at the TCIC. The Tenovus nurse comes from an outside agency into the phrenetic world of out-patient care. The new role is not clearly defined as each client group has different needs, and new relationships have to be formed with a whole host of established staff. This practice note will chart the development of the role of one of the TSNs during the first year of appointment in a head and neck cancer clinic.

Grants lure young researchers back home

milan One of Italy's largest cancer research charities is to offer start-up grants designed to lure back the many talented young scientists working abroad.