Establishing a translational leader in precision medicine through knowledge transfer to develop point-of-care drug monitoring technologies

这种双向合作为纽卡斯尔大学的一名借调人员提供了与创新型生物医学初创公司Vesynta Ltd合作开发新型伴侣监测工具的机会，使医生能够准确监测儿童抗癌药物的暴露情况。它将提供一种即时的、简单易用的床边测量血液中药物浓度的方法：这是护理方面的一项重要改进。癌症是0-14岁儿童的主要死亡原因。给儿童提供最安全、最有效的抗癌药物剂量是医生面临的临床挑战。他们目前以患者的身高和体重为指导，计算出患者将服用多少抗癌药物。然而，由于儿童身体对药物的处理方式非常不同，这种方法并不准确，导致患者之间的药物暴露存在显著差异。因此，约40%的儿童遭受与药物有关的副作用，这降低了他们的生活质量，并花费了医疗保健提供者的费用。为了给出正确的治疗量，医生需要技术来提供实时和准确的患者药物暴露数据；然而，这些信息很少获得，而且很难获得。Vesynta已经开发了一种技术，承诺满足这些标准，但它需要对其技术进行质量保证，进一步的设计考虑以确保其适合最终用户，并将该技术扩展到也用于儿童的联合药物，以确保患者获得最大利益。该项目将利用借调人员在药物测试开发、临床药理学和使用分析仪器解决问题方面的技能来验证平台技术。作为回报，借调的学生将成为纽卡斯尔大学的“翻译和创新主管”，掌握人的因素设计、医疗器械监管和卫生经济学方面的技能。该项目将建立在患者、家长和医生表达的需求的基础上，这些需求来自借调人员设计的利益相关者参与研讨会，他们还应通过临床试验设计支持后续研究计划。这项精心规划的研究将在技能、知识和职业孔洞方面为借调人员和东道国组织提供好处。该项目的成功实施将推动借调人员实现他的职业抱负，并支持Vesynta加快他们的研发活动。至关重要的是，促进生物医学创新将加快儿科肿瘤学个性化医学的实施，造福儿童和更广泛的医疗保健部门。更新(2022年10月)-在与我们的项目经理(Liz Littlewood)讨论后，我们有了一名新的借调人员，在大学这里的人员变动后，我们将推进这个项目。由于新借调人员在东道国组织中的角色相似，新借调人员的学习成绩与原始学习成果的匹配率为90%，他们的角色与最初的建议完全一致。

This bi-directional collaboration, offers a secondee from Newcastle University an opportunity to work with an innovative biomedical start-up, Vesynta Ltd, for the development of a novel companion monitoring tool, enabling doctors to accurately monitor anti-cancer drug-exposure in children. It will provide an immediate, simple to use, bedside measurement of medicine concentration in the blood: an essential improvement in care.Cancer is the leading cause of death in children aged 0-14 years. Giving the safest and most effective dose of anti-cancer drugs to children is a clinical challenge for doctors. They currently calculate the amount of anti-cancer drugs the patient will have using their height and weight as a guide. However, as children's bodies all process medicines very differently, this method is not accurate and leads to marked differences in drug exposure between patients. As a result, ~40% of children suffer from medicine related side-effects which reduces their quality of life and costs healthcare providers.To give the correct amount of treatment, doctors need technologies which provide real-time and accurate patient drug exposure data; yet, this information is rarely available and challenging tto obtain. Vesynta has developed a technology with promises to meet these criteria, however, it requires quality assurance over its technology, further design considerations to ensure it is suited for the end-user, and an expansion of the technology to co-medicines which are also given to children, to ensure maximum patient benefit.This project will leverage the secondee's skills in drug testing development, clinical pharmacology and problem-solving using analytical instruments, to validate the platform technology. In return, the secondee shall become a 'Translation and Innovation Lead' at Newcastle University, with skills exposure to human factors design, medical device regulation and health economics. The project shall build on the voiced needs of patients, parents and doctors, as captured from stakeholder engagement workshops designed by the secondee, who shall also support follow-up research plans through clinical trial design.This carefully planned research, will provide benefit to both secondee and host organisation, in terms of skills, knowledge and career porosity. The successful delivery of this project will propel the secondee in his professional ambitions and support Vesynta in accelerating their research and development activity. Crucially, facilitation of biomedical innovation will fast-track the implementation of personalised medicine in paediatric oncology, for the benefit to children and the wider healthcare sector.Update (Oct. 2022) - following discussion with our project manager (Liz Littlewood) we have a new secondee in place to take this project forward following staffing changes here at the university. The new secondee has a >90% match of the original learning outcomes and their role exactly aligns with the original proposals, due to similarity of the role the new individual holds within the host organization.