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. 2022 May:166:208-218.
doi: 10.1016/j.ejca.2022.01.030. Epub 2022 Mar 17.

Correlation between drug sensitivity profiles of circulating tumour cell-derived organoids and clinical treatment response in patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma

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Free article

Correlation between drug sensitivity profiles of circulating tumour cell-derived organoids and clinical treatment response in patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma

Yuan-Hung Wu et al. Eur J Cancer. 2022 May.
Free article

Abstract

Introduction: Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is highly aggressive and has poor prognosis. There are few biomarkers to inform treatment decisions, and collecting tumour samples for testing is challenging.

Methods: Circulating tumour cells (CTCs) from patients with PDAC liquid biopsies were expanded ex vivo to form CTC-derived organoid cultures, using a laboratory-developed biomimetic cell culture system. CTC-derived organoids were tested for sensitivity to a PDAC panel of nine drugs, with tests conducted in triplicate, and a weighted cytotoxicity score (CTS) was calculated from the results. Clinical response to treatment in patients was evaluated using Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumours (RECIST) version 1.1 criteria at the time of blood sampling and 3 months later. The correlation between CTS and clinical response was then assessed.

Results: A total of 41 liquid biopsies (87.8% from patients with Stage 4 disease) were collected from 31 patients. The CTC-derived organoid expansion was achieved in 3 weeks, with 87.8% culture efficiency. CTC-derived organoid cultures were positive for EpCAM staining and negative for CD45 staining in the surface marker analysis. All patients had received a median of two lines of treatment prior to enrolment and prospective utility analysis indicated significant correlation of CTS with clinical treatment response. Two representative case studies are also presented to illustrate the relevant clinical contexts.

Conclusions: CTCs were expanded from patients with PDAC liquid biopsies with a high success rate. Drug sensitivity profiles from CTC-derived organoid cultures correlated meaningfully with treatment response. Further studies are warranted to validate the predictive potential for this approach.

Keywords: Antitumour drug screening assays; Circulating tumour cells; Liquid biopsy; Medical oncology; Pancreatic ductal carcinoma; Personalised medicine.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interest statement The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: Long-Sheng Lu, Yin-Ju Chen, Peng-Yuan Wang and Thierry Burnouf share patent inventorship for eSelect. Yuan-Hung Wu owns stock shares of CancerFree Biotech Ltd, which licenses eSelect technology from Taipei Medical University. Yi-Hsuan Chen is a current employee of CancerFree Biotech Ltd. The other authors declare no relevant conflicts of interest.

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