Will Comparative Oncology Last?
Comparative oncology means taking a one medicine approach, and if you can prove something will work in more than 1 species, it is more likely to be a successful treatment in real life. Heather Wilson-Robles, DVM, DACVIM (Oncology), associate professor in the veterinary medicine and biomedical sciences department at Texas A&M University, explains how using pathways across species is important to the future of cancer treatments.
Comparative oncology means taking a one medicine approach, and if you can prove something will work in more than 1 species, it is more likely to be a successful treatment in real life. Heather Wilson-Robles, DVM, DACVIM (Oncology), associate professor in the veterinary medicine and biomedical sciences department at Texas A&M University, explains how using pathways across species is important to the future of cancer treatments.
Dogs, which metabolize drugs very similarly to humans, are an ideal model for cancer trials. Wilson-Robles says by incorporating dogs into these trials, we can get better attrition of drugs that don’t work earlier—cutting down the cost of successful drugs when they go to market.
