Avera Health, an integrated regional health care system that serves 300 locations across the Upper Midwest, and Theralink Technologies, a precision medicine company with a novel phosphoprotein-based assay for breast cancer, have announced a strategic collaboration to advance comprehensive molecular profiling, enabling Avera Health’s providers and patients to benefit from data-driven insights that inform targeted cancer treatments.
Changing Cancer Care Together
Avera has a history in precision oncology with patients’ tumors being genetically sequenced to guide individualized cancer care. Theralink, with its patented protein and phosphoprotein biomarker platform and lab developed test, is the only commercially available assay for clinical use that measures the tumor cell levels of activated proteins, which are the primary targets of most FDA-approved therapies and biopharmaceutical investigational drugs.
Theralink will provide key patient-specific information about which drug targets are activated and “in use” in each patient tumor sample. This information, coupled with the genomics findings, will provide a comprehensive molecular profile for all Avera oncology patients by way of a multiomic report used for physician treatment decisions.
“Avera has been a cancer care leader in our region for many years. Avera Cancer Institute is focused on actionable insights for our physicians and patients to make treatment decisions that are personalized,” said Casey Williams, chief scientific officer and executive director of Cancer Research. “We understand the role this innovative approach plays in generating better health outcomes for our patients, and Theralink will play a key role in that process.”
“We believe that the Theralink protein/phosphoprotein data, combined with the next generation sequencing data, may give Avera Cancer Institute the most cutting edge and best precision oncology data in the world, potentially creating a step change in cancer care,” said Mick Ruxin, M.D., president & CEO of Theralink. He went on to say, “It is gratifying to know that a large, prestigious, midwest cancer program, Avera Health, has realized the significant potential value of our Theralink assay for their cancer patients.”
Dr. Ruxin continued, “We expect great results from working with Avera and their patients in our goal to decrease the morbidity and mortality of cancer patients.”
As part of this collaboration, Avera will assist Theralink Technologies in validating new clinical assays for additional tumors (such as GYN, Head and Neck, GI, Lung, Kidney, Liver and Prostate) through retrospective case analysis and population-based data. This may bring new capability and insights to precision oncology care and allow for the Theralink assay to become a pan-tumor assay.
