Researchers in the U.K. have overthrown the orthodox view that childhood cancers have a low mutation burden, opening up new drug targets and opportunities for repurposing existing therapies. In particular, a high mutation rate is associated with a response to cancer immunotherapy. But although PD-1 checkpoint inhibitors are approved for treating pediatric cancers with a high level of microsatellite instability mutations, in general it is thought childhood tumors are not amenable to immunotherapy.
Researchers in the U.K. have overthrown the orthodox view that childhood cancers have a low mutation burden, opening up new drug targets and opportunities for repurposing existing therapies. In particular, a high mutation rate is associated with a response to cancer immunotherapy. But although PD-1 checkpoint inhibitors are approved for treating pediatric cancers with a high level of microsatellite instability mutations, in general it is thought childhood tumors are not amenable to immunotherapy.
The U.K. National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) gave the nod to a total of 11 robotic surgical systems for use in the U.K.’s trusts, but this is no free pass as the agency expects the manufacturers of these systems to gather data under this conditional coverage framework.
Neuranics Ltd. recently raised $8 million in seed funding which is “extremely important” for the company as it looks to scale its magnetic sensing technology, which detects muscle activity without touching the skin, Noel McKenna, CEO told BioWorld. “The funds will help accelerate our go to market strategy and advance our R&D roadmap,” he said.
Calla Lily Clinical Care Ltd. secured £1 million (US$1.3 million) in funding from the National Institute for Health and Care Research to begin clinical trials of Callavid, a drug delivery technology which treats women at risk of miscarriage.
Pharma companies in the U.K. said the rebate they are required to make on drug sales is making the country “un-investible,” prompting staff cuts and leading clinical research partnerships to be unwound. Rather than the 15.3% rebate on branded drugs companies expected to pay this year, the rate has leapt to 22.9%. That has left the Voluntary Scheme for Branded Medicine Pricing and Access “in crisis,” according to the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industries.
The U.K.’s national health service (NHS) is rolling out a new artificial intelligence (AI)-powered tool which can predict a patient’s risk of falling with a 97% accuracy rate. The AI software designed by Cera Care Ltd. is already in use in more than two-thirds of NHS integrated care systems across the country and NHS England hopes that the tool will prevent around 2,000 falls and hospital admissions each day.
The U.K. has released a huge repository of children’s genomic data after sequencing blood samples from three large cohorts recruited at birth and followed across three decades. The power of the data is amplified by the large volume of longitudinal health information, biological samples and responses to surveys and questionnaires that has been provided by participating families. Before this, large-scale publicly available genome sequences were limited to adult cohorts, and the only childhood genome sequence data was from children with rare diseases.
The U.K. has released a huge repository of children’s genomic data after sequencing blood samples from three large cohorts recruited at birth and followed across three decades. The power of the data is amplified by the large volume of longitudinal health information, biological samples and responses to surveys and questionnaires that has been provided by participating families.
Organox Ltd. raised $142 million in financing to accelerate the growth of its Metra platform that preserves and transport livers for transplantation. The funds will allow the company to strengthen its ability to support current customers, expand its customer base and enter new markets such as Canada and Australia, where it earned regulatory approvals within the last year, Steve Deitsch, CFO of Organox, told BioWorld.
