Amy LeBlanc, DVM DACVIM (Oncology)

Director, NCI/CCR/Comparative Oncology Program

Comparative oncology clinical trials play an important and growing role in cancer research and drug development efforts. These trials, conducted in companion (pet) animals, allow assessment of novel anticancer agents in a veterinary clinical setting that supports serial biologic sample collections and exploration of dose, schedule, and corresponding pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic relationships. Further, an intact immune system and natural co-evolution of tumor and microenvironment support exploration of novel immunotherapeutic strategies in these veterinary patients. Significant improvements in our collective understanding of the molecular landscape of veterinary cancers, mainly in dogs, have occurred in the last 10 years, facilitating the translational research process and supporting the inclusion of comparative studies into the drug development paradigm. Further, recent clinical trials carried out in pet dogs demonstrate how this approach can assess efficacy in a variety of settings, including but not limited to single agent or combination response rates, inhibition of metastatic progression, and randomized comparison of multiple agents in a simultaneous head-to-head fashion. Such comparative oncology studies have been purposefully included in the developmental plan for several FDA-approved and up-and-coming anticancer drugs. Challenges for this field include keeping pace with technology and data dissemination/harmonization, improving annotation of the canine genome and immune system, and generation of canine-specific validated reagents to support integration of correlative biology within clinical trial efforts.

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