Investigators: Terry Pham, Raelene Endersby, Nick Gottardo, Hetal Dholaria
Brain tumours affect approximately 200 children in Australia each year and are responsible for more deaths in the 0–14 year age group than any other disease. This project is focused on medulloblastoma which arises in the cerebellum. Surgical resection, with DNA damaging radiation therapy and chemotherapy are the mainstays of front-line treatment. These treatments have very damaging side-effects; thus, survivors of childhood brain tumours, require screening for late effects of cancer therapies, regular surveillance for tumour recurrence, and surveillance for development of secondary malignancies.
Due to the impact of their cancer and treatment on the developing nervous system, these patients have increased risk of medical, neurologic, cognitive, and psychosocial morbidities. These include late-onset neurologic deficits (headaches, seizures, coordination problems, motor problems, vision problems, and vertigo), psychiatric disease, endocrine, circulatory, musculoskeletal, and renal dysfunction. Clearly, regular medical care is required for survivors which impacts broadly on the health care system.
To improve long term outcomes for survivors, new regimens that facilitate a reduction in radiation dose without compromising survival rates must be developed. We identified that inhibitors of the DNA damage response are promising drugs for medulloblastoma. Furthermore, we have shown that these drugs improve the efficacy of traditional medulloblastoma treatments and hypothesise that their addition to clinical treatment schedules will improve efficacy, consequently permitting a reduction in the radiation dose without decreasing survival rates. This may reduce long-term debilitating toxicity and even increase cure rates.
The objective of this study is to determine the potential health and economic benefits of improved medulloblastoma treatments that reduce the number of side effects experienced by survivors. Specifically, we aim to (1) estimate the current health and economic burdens caused by medulloblastoma treatment each year in Western Australia and (2) use these estimates to explore the health and economic gains that less toxic treatment protocols will achieve.
Collaborators
- Elizabeth Geelhoad