This is an investigational procedure in which standard agents and new drugs used in cancer treatment are tested against patient tumor cells in petri dishes. The test plates are incubated for fourteen days, at which time growth is examined under a microscope. A report of the results is mailed to the patient's doctor who evaluates the data to determine what effect the agents tested have on a patient's tumor cells. This test has been performed on more than 26,000 individual tumors. The number of chemotherapeutics that can be tested varies with the number of cells available from a particular specimen.
Every effort is made to test all drugs requested by the physician.
Chemotherapeutics used in testing include standard agents and new Phase I and II drugs that have been approved for patient testing. Seventy percent of drugs that respond in the cloning assay have been shown to be responsive in the patients. Therefore, a physician can avoid trying a drug with unpleasant side effects that has no value in the treatment process. Many pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies rely upon the IDD's preclinical models and pharmacology capabilities as extensions of their own research capabilities. IDD research programs targeted for development over the next several years include genitourinary oncology, gastrointestinal oncology, pediatric oncology, and genomic technology.