DeciBio Liquid Biopsy Weekly Digest
November 3rd, 2020
This week's news contained quite a few circulating tumor cell (CTC) headlines. In a small study, Rarecells' ISET platform was used to detect PSA positive CTCs and found to have a positive predictive value of 99% and a negative predictive value of 97% for prostate cancer detection. While a promising start to improving prostate cancer detection, much more data needs to be generated as well as the inclusion of risk scoring to determine the Gleason Grade of detected cancers. Epic and Predicine have partnered to offer comprehensive genomic profiling and CTC analysis from a single blood draw. By allowing for genomic and phenotypic analysis from the same sample, the companies hope to provide richer data for cancer profiling, therapy response monitoring, and MRD detection in clinical trials. Lastly, after touting an FDA submission for Parsortix (a CTC capturing device), Angle plc raised £20m to continue its growth. The raise will be used to develop 2 laboratories to process patient samples as well as develop PD-L1 CTC assays for immunotherapies.
Factors such as favorable screening recommendations, adherence to screening, reimbursement conditions, well-understood cancer biology and market size (screening population) make colorectal cancer an ideal target indication for the development of early detection liquid biopsy assays. CRC is the assay candidate many companies are hoping to enter the early detection market with. Recently the United States Preventative Services Task Force (USPSTF) released a draft guidance document that drops the recommended screening age from 50 to 45. An expansion in the recommended screening population directly increases the market size of for CRC early detection assays and makes this indication even more attractive to target.
Be sure to check out the stories from Nucleix and Helio as well!
