This article was published in Innovative Veterinary Care Journal.
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Cancer treatment in companion animals can have unpredictable results. Different breeds have different genetic makeups — leading to different drug responses. Veterinarians often have to alter a treatment path because drugs for a particular patient stop working, while the cancer invasion lingers on. The good news is that data science can significantly improve cancer treatment outcomes in your patients.
Data science is changing the world we live in. It is not only helping businesses reap revenues, but is also helping medical science evolve. The advent of precision medicine along with data science has the potential to increase recovery rates. Genomic data is a pivotal pillar of precision medicine. This data can help bring wonderful advancements in veterinary medicine by leveraging the right tools. In fact, veterinary cancer treatments can now readily profit from the technology-based drug response predictions made available by ImpriMed.
ImpriMed is a precision medicine company focused on countering cancer. They have started their cancer war by helping animals, and are currently offering canine lymphoma and leukemia drug response prediction profiles by using data science and AI. They are also conducting an ongoing study on feline neoplasia.
IMPRIMED’S FIRST PUBLISHED STUDY ON CANINE LYMPHOMA
This study involved a combination of ex vivo and immunophenotyping assays with computational modeling. Published in Veterinary and Comparative Oncology in October 2020, it involved 261 canine lymphoma patients who were given at least one of the five common chemotherapy agents (doxorubicin, vincristine, cyclophosphamide, lomustine, and rabacfosadine). Canine lymph node cells were collected through fine needle aspiration, and the post-treatment clinical response was recorded. Flow cytometry was applied for immunophenotyping and ex vivo chemosensitivity testing.
The acquired data was then used to train computational models. These machine learning models enabled the transfer of ex vivo chemosensitivity assay results into a predicted probability of in vivo drug efficacy. The results clearly show that this method can improve treatment outcomes by establishing predictive estimates.
WHAT DOES IMPRIMED OFFER VETERINARIANS?
ImpriMed offers a drug response prediction profile based on its novel AI platform. The company’s AI has been trained by varied sets of exclusive real-world clinical data, which translates into remarkable results.
Veterinarians can now send fine needle aspirates of their canine patients to ImpriMed and get a highly advanced drug response prediction profile within seven days. This allows you to carefully select a treatment regimen that is most likely to bring remission.
ImpriMed also provides other services, including immune profiling using flow cytometry and PCR for antigen receptor rearrangements, flow cytometry only, and PCR for antigen receptor rearrangements only.
Another way that you could help ImpriMed in their feline neoplasia study by sending samples of suspected neoplasia cases for free flow cytometry and PARR. ImpriMed offers virtual educational meetings regarding feline immunophenotyping for each sample.
