Fighting cancer: a major challenge for our society
Cancer affects one in two men and one in three women during their lifetime. Major advances in cancer detection, management, and treatment have emerged in recent decades and have led to a considerable improvement in patients' quality of life overall. Despite this, every year around 20 million people worldwide are diagnosed with cancer, and approximately 10 million die from the disease.
The Center for Translational Research in Onco-Hematology (CRTOH), created in 2017 through a public-private partnership and notably with the exceptional support of private foundations, brings together internationally renowned clinicians and researchers whose goal is to make discoveries that can be quickly applied to benefit patients. This involves a critical mass of around 300 researchers working to better understand the disease and identify the therapeutic solutions of tomorrow. A key element in the success of this endeavor is the generation of tumor data for many patients: the creation of a leading digital infrastructure is therefore essential.
This digital infrastructure aims to better predict the progression of each tumor and its response to treatment, and will usher in a new era in cancer research and tumor treatment.
Today, treatment choices remain primarily influenced by the organ of origin of the tumor (for example, breast and colon cancers are often treated differently). This is the case despite the fact that the effectiveness of a treatment can vary greatly among patients with the “same” cancer.
One approach that promises to revolutionize patient care is personalized oncology. In this context, treatment decisions are no longer based solely on the origin of the tumor, but also on its broad cellular and molecular characteristics.
Tumors are not simply clusters of cancer cells acting alone. In reality, they are part of a complex system called the tumor microenvironment. This environment is composed of different types of cells, including immune cells and support cells, which can either help the cancer grow or fight it. This complexity shows us how important it is to understand the various roles played by these components in cancer. Therefore, understanding the location of different cells in tumors and how they interact with each other is particularly useful. Today, new methods of analyzing tumor samples allow us to examine in detail the diversity of the cells present and their interactions, and thus the complexity of each tumor. This is crucial for predicting how tumors will evolve and respond to treatment. A key element in the success of this endeavor is the generation of tumor data for many patients.
The CRTOH has already set up a leading digital infrastructure that connects two types of data:
1) digitized (complex, spatial) data from tumor tissues and 2) digitized clinical data from patients whose tumor tissues were sourced. Combining this different information will provide a better understanding of the complexity of each tumor and its association with the progression of the disease. Ultimately, the goal of this tool is to promote large-scale collaborations between researchers and clinicians in the Lake Geneva region and beyond to make discoveries that contribute to the effectiveness of personalized medicine.
The proposed approach to analyzing digitized tumor tissue is reinforced by the fact that the HUG has made data science and digitization an institutional priority, with precision oncology being one of its spearheads.
The data collected is intended to support the Molecular Tumor Board, the key clinical decision-making body for proposing personalized treatment options. Its success relies on close collaboration with the pathology service at the HUG.
The use of this digital infrastructure should enable discoveries that pave the way for personalized medicine, where treatments can be tailored specifically to each patient based on the unique characteristics of their tumor.
We stand at the dawn of this medical revolution, which aims to deliver ‘the right medicine to the right patient at the right time’—that is, truly personalized treatments that enhance each individual’s chances of response.