The mission of the Society is to improve patient care and outcomes by facilitating implementation of functional assays into clinical care. The purposes are to foster research and development of functional precision medicine solutions across medicine; to accelerate the dissemination of new and relevant research findings among interested parties; to promote education and training about functional precision medicine; to foster solutions for clinical testing of functional precision medicine approaches; and to improve efficiency of adoption of functional precision medicine solutions through interaction with academia, regulatory bodies, industry, and patients.
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EHA-SFPM Precision Medicine Meeting
The SFPM is excited to announce that in partnership with European Hematology Association, we will be organizing a Precision Medicine Meeting; Bridging between functional and genomic precision medicine, to be held September 25-27, 2024, Copenhagen, Denmark. We will continue to post updates as they become available.
March 11 - 13, 2025
Hyatt Regency Boston
Boston, Massachusetts
CONFERENCE CO-CHAIRS:
Anthony G. Letai, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts
Elaine R. Mardis, The Institute for Genomic Medicine at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Columbus, Ohio
Peter Horak, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany
Alice Soragni, University of California, Los Angeles, California
FUNCTIONAL AND GENOMIC PRECISION MEDICINE IN CANCER: DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVES, COMMON GOALS
Precision medicine applied to oncology aims to match each patient to the right therapy. Heretofore, genomics has been the main tool in performing precision medicine. Yet, many cancer patients lack actionable alterations as there is a limited set of highly predictive biomarkers to accurately match patients to effective therapies. There is a need to extend the benefits of precision medicine to a larger proportion of cancer patients. Therefore, additional strategies need to be explored. One important approach is functional precision medicine, a strategy by which living patient tumor cells are exposed to therapies and signals measured to predict clinical response. The goal of this AACR Special Conference is to share experiences among those in the genomics and functional precision oncology arenas, to accelerate the progress toward routine clinical adoption of combined approaches in the oncology clinic. At this exciting program in Boston we will share technical, clinical, and logistical experiences, as well as our understanding of the barriers to widespread adoption of genomic and functional precision medicine in the treatment of the cancer patient, and how these approaches might be combined to provide more powerful tools than either alone.
Do you want to help shape the future of the SFPM? Self-nominate for a board position today and lend your experience and input!
Open positions for this election cycle include
Positions will be filled by vote of the Professional or Associate members in good standing. You must be a Professional or Associate member to view the form and apply.
The SFPM arose out of recognition of the unmet need in matching cancer patients to the therapies best suited for them. Through the use of functional assays, we hope to bridge the gap between patients and the treatments best suited for their cancer. This is possible through research, communication, and collaboration amongst our members and with outreach to the cancer therapy community as a whole. To further the mission, we offer our members the following exclusive benefits
Applications for membership may be submitted at any time during the year. We look forward to having you onboard!
Come join us for our Virtual Monthly Seminar which will bring together a unique mix of pharmaceutical, academic and technology leaders, the series should not be missed for those interested in the use of assaying technology to further biomarker discovery, drug R&D and personalized healthcare outcomes.
Wednesday, May 8, 2024
12:00 PM EDT
Meeting URL: www.zoom.us
Meeting ID: 828 5622 5783
Passcode: 027718
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SFPM board member Diana Azzam, PhD, and researchers at FIU developed a new approach to targeting hard-to-treat cancers. The method was used successfully for the first time for relapsed pediatric patients.
Cancer patients with advanced-stage disease have poor prognosis, typically having limited options for efficacious treatment, and genomics-based therapy guidance continues to benefit only a fraction of patients. Next-generation ex vivo approaches, such as cell mass-based response testing (MRT), offer an alternative precision medicine approach for a broader population of patients with cancer, but validation of clinical feasibility and potential impact remain necessary.
Tony Letai, MD, PhD, Professor at Dana Farber Cancer Institute, and President, Society for Functional Precision Medicine, led a discussion on "Functional Precision Medicine for Advanced Cancer". As we look at novel, personalized therapies, how can we have confidence that they will work?
Noah Berlow, PhD, CTO, First Ascent Biomedical, and Diana Azzam, PhD, Assistant Professor at Florida International University, led a discussion on their approach to functional drug testing and using AI/ML to guide complex treatment decisions for advanced cancer patients.
Payel Chatterjee, Chief Scientist, SEngine Precision Medicine, led a discussion on the role of organoids in guiding cancer treatment decisions. The value proposition of “functional testing” (applying 100 or more drugs to fresh tumor tissue and seeing how the cancer responds) is that this very direct approach can identify unexpected drugs to try, and extraordinary results, for some patients.
Ex vivo drug response profiling is a powerful tool to study genotype–drug response associations and is being explored as a tool set for precision medicine in cancer. Here we conducted a prospective non-interventional trial to investigate feasibility of ex vivo drug response profiling for treatment guidance in hematologic malignancies (SMARTrial, NCT03488641). We conclude that ex vivo drug response profiling is clinically feasible and has the potential to predict chemotherapy response in individuals with hematologic malignancies beyond clinically established genetic markers.
The SFPM is growing, and we need financial support. While we collect annual individual membership dues, these only fund a fraction of our needs. To plan for the future, the SFPM must secure a stable financial basis from which to plan. Even though the Board is made up of unpaid volunteers, we nonetheless have significant costs to defray, particularly with respect to annual meetings and administrative support.
Contributions from all tiers will be recognized by name on the SFPM website, however, contributions at the Precision tier will receive preferred logo placement and recognition on the SFPM website, logo and name recognition at each monthly seminar, and institution name and logo prominently displayed at our annual meeting and on meeting marketing materials. Precision tier supporters will also receive ten (10) complimentary memberships to be distributed amongst their institutions. Functional tier supporters will receive name and logo recognition during at least six of our monthly seminars as well as name and logo recognition on our website. Functional tier supporters will also receive five (5) complimentary memberships to be distributed amongst their institutions. Advocate tier supporters will receive name and logo recognition on our website and one (1) complimentary membership. We hope you agree with us that “the future is functional”, and that the SFPM is getting us there faster.
