Early diagnosis of Pancreatic Cancer - Implementation of biomarkers in a clinical setting

Purpose and goal

The goal of the project, to develop a biomarker signature for earlier and better diagnosis of pancreatic cancer (PDAC) has been achieved. The project has been successful and all steps including, sample availability and preparation, microarray production, quantification, analysis etc. have worked better than expected. Logistics when health organizations, academia and industry are working together are complex and can often delay development, but in this project, it has worked very well. Despite this rapid development in the project, quality has been maintained at the highest level

Expected results and effects

The aim of the project, to develop a pre-validated biomarker signature for earlier and better diagnosis of pancreatic cancer (PDAC) has been fulfilled. The analysis was based on 1416 clinically well-documented serum samples from Herlev Hospital (DK). In parallel, the results have been validated in additional retrospective cohort with very good results. Immunovia AB will now take these results further to develop and commercialize a diagnostic test for the early diagnosis of PDAC. In parallel, a manuscript for disseminating the results will soon be completed.

Planned approach and implementation

The project as well as the collaboration between academia and industry has worked very well and several parts of the project have been completed before the original schedule. All milestones for the project have been achieved and the aim to obtain a pre-validated biomarker signature that distinguishes early stage I/II of PDAC from healthy controls has succeeded. Several milestones were achieved 4 months before plan, which allowed for more time to be spent on the final bioinformatics analyzes and the project could still be completed well in line with the original plan.