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Artificial Intelligence guided treatment for Lymphoma

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Science & Technology Singapore (Commonwealth Union) – The role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) continues to have a significant impact in a variety of areas from marketing to medicine. The role of AI to predict patterns from previously gathered data is likely to play a crucial role in personalized treatments in the coming years ahead.

 A recent study has indicated that AI-guided treatments benefitted patients whose cancers grow even with standard treatments. The study published by experts in Singapore demonstrate that an AI platform that identifies patient-specific drug combinations can benefit those with relapsed lymphomas.

The study was published in the journal Science Translational Medicine in October,which was the 1st study displaying the feasibility of personalized drug combination prediction for patients having lymphoma, applying a novel procedure known as QPOP (quadratic phenotypic optimization platform) that was formed at the National University of Singapore (NUS).

The process is based on obtaining a small tumor sample from a patient followed by its incubation in a laboratory with a set of 12 carefully chosen drugs given for lymphoma. When 72 hours, have passed QPOP then ranks the patient’s cancer cells’ possible response to over 750 distinct drug combinations of up to 4 drugs, utilizing these 12 possible drugs.

The study for the clinical application of QPOP, was the first-of-its-kind, that was a partnership between clinicians at the National University Cancer Institute, Singapore (NCIS) and scientists from the Cancer Science Institute of Singapore (CSI Singapore) at NUS.

Prior research that was based on forecasting the sensitivity of single drugs for treatment as a result of restrictions on the amount of tissue obtained from biopsies. The automated workflow and AI methods in QPOP permitted scientists to utilize even lesser amounts of tissue from biopsies for the evaluation of combination drug sensitivities.

Lead investigator of the study, Assistant Professor Anand Jeyasekharan, who is also Consultant at the Department of Haematology-Oncology, NCIS, indicated that lymphoma is generally treated with chemotherapy combinations, however around 4 in 10 patients with aggressive lymphomas may eventually become unresponsive to standard medications or suffer from a relapse.

Such an occurrence limits the treatment options. When patients reach third-line treatment, their chance of a positive outcome in response to standard chemotherapy combinations is only around 10%.

The research demonstrates that 65 out of 71 patients that took part had a successful QPOP test, with the marking of patient-specific combinations within a week of having the biopsy. For the patients who had lymphomas resistant to standard therapy, 17 proceeded to QPOP-guided treatments based on previous clinical evidence and physician discretion.

Among these 17 patients, 5 had a complete response to the treatment, such that they had no further signs of cancer, 3 patients had a partial response and the remaining 9 had stable disease or progressive disease.

The researchers indicated that the unusual nature to see these full and partial responses to a unique combination in patients who would or else have had no effective standard treatments.

 “The individualised treatment offered through QPOP is a departure from the traditional approach where doctors follow standard protocols based on the subtype of cancer. QPOP can quickly derive a likely effective treatment for the patient without having to subject him or her to the actual physical burden of the drugs, saving precious time and resources,” explained Associate Professor Edward Chow, Principal Investigator at CSI Singapore and lead scientific researcher who led the development of QPOP.

“We know that cancer is very difficult to treat, so we hope to at least prolong survival time and make cancer patients’ lives a little better,” said Professor Chow.

Researchers believe that QPOP may eventually be used in all types of cancer, however this will be reliant on advances in culturing cancer cells and tumor tissues in the laboratory. Instead of utilizing QPOP once other treatment options are out, they hope to eventually apply the technology at earlier stages of treatment so it could possibly be more economical for patients.

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