To help Taiwan’s pharmaceutical industry develop medicines against six types of cancer, the Ministry of Health and Welfare (MOHW) announced that it would launch a pilot program offering genetic testing of cancer patients, the ministry said on Thursday.
The program, developed by the ministry, the National Health Research Institutes (NHRI) and Roche Diagnostics Taiwan, would offer testing to more than 1,000 patients at designated hospitals by the second half of this year, it said.
Samples of cancer tissue would be analyzed for mutations to help Roche and other pharmaceutical companies recommend targeted therapies to doctors at the hospitals, the ministry said.
The pilot program would enroll people with advanced-stage stomach, esophageal, gall bladder, pancreatic or bile duct cancer, as well as non-squamous non-small cell lung carcinoma, it said.
For those enrolled in the program, the genetic testing would be free, it said, adding that the paid testing costs about NT$100,000 per patient.
The program would enhance cancer patients’ chance of survival and contribute to the development of precision medicine in Taiwan, Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中) said at the program’s launch event.
This would include tailoring disease prevention or treatment techniques based on a person’s genes, environment and lifestyle, rather than using a one-size-fits-all approach based on average cancer cases, he said
The program would generate data for the use in drug development and the drug approval process, Chen said.
NHRI president Liang Kung-yee (梁賡義) said that the program marks the first time that the National Biobank Consortium of Taiwan has partnered with an international pharmaceutical company.
Genetic testing under the program would start as early as in the middle of this year, Liang said.
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