200,000 women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer world-wide annually, and only, 40% survive five years, a figure which has not changed significantly for decades. The current practise of treating ovarian cancer as a single disease has been a barrier to improvement in outcomes. We now understand that there are multiple distinct subtypes of ovarian cancer that vary considerably in their biological behaviour and response to standard platinum-based chemotherapy, requiring a more nuanced approach to care.
My AGCF Research Project centres on the genomic analysis of ovarian cancer patients with low-grade serous carcinoma (LGSC), a subtype that tends to occur in younger women and does not respond to current standard chemotherapy.
I aim to comprehensively analyse genomic alterations and functionally validate newly identified mutations. This will ultimately allow us to screen for more targeted inhibitors and drug combinations that may constitute novel effective treatment strategies, improve response rates, and reduce the risk of side effects of drugs that provide no therapeutic gain. We will leverage our experience in LGSC trials to rapidly advance our research results into the clinic.
This work would not be possible without the gracious support from both the AGCF and Way In Network. I hope together we can make a difference for women diagnosed with the under-studied LGSC subtype, and we can address the treatment inequalities in this poor outcome group.