Caris Life Sciences Designates West Virginia University Cancer Institute a Caris Center of Excellence for Precision Medicine

West Virginia University joins Precision Medicine Network to broaden access and advance clinical utility of tumor profiling

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Caris Life Sciences

Nov 03, 2016, 08:45 ET

IRVING, Texas, Nov. 3, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Caris Life Sciences^®, a leading biotechnology company focused on fulfilling the promise of precision medicine, today announced the designation of the West Virginia University (WVU) Cancer Institute as a center of excellence site in the Caris Centers of Excellence for Precision Medicine Network^™ (Network).

"The state of West Virginia has the third highest cancer mortality rate in the nation and West Virginia University has demonstrated a strong commitment to reduce cancer deaths by providing access to the latest, most innovative treatments spanning all facets of cancer care, including comprehensive tumor profiling to enable the delivery of precision medicine," said Dr. John Marshall, Chairman of the Network, Professor of Medicine and Oncology at Georgetown University School of Medicine, and Chief of Hematology/Oncology at Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center. "We are excited to welcome the West Virginia University Cancer Institute to the Network and begin collaborating on important precision medicine initiatives."

The WVU Cancer Institute will actively participate in the development of standards of care and best practices for integrating and utilizing molecular profiling in oncology practice, while also striving to optimize the adoption and patient access to personalized medicine in clinical settings. The Institute will also leverage Caris' multiple-technology tumor profiling service, Caris Molecular Intelligence®, to enable the practice of precision medicine by identifying therapy options and clinical trial opportunities based on the unique molecular characteristics of a patient's tumor.

"A comprehensive understanding of the molecular drivers of cancer has become critically important in recent years to develop innovative and better ways to treat our patients under the paradigm of personalized cancer care. Tumor profiling with Caris Molecular Intelligence empowers our patients, and provides our physicians with personalized genomic and proteomic insights to make molecularly informed treatment decisions," said Dr. Patrick Ma, Associate Professor of Medicine and Co-leader of the Sara Crile Allen and James Frederick Allen Lung Cancer Program at the WVU Cancer Institute. "We look forward to working collaboratively with other leading cancer centers across the country to combine data sets, further clinical trial development and ensure cancer patients have access to the highest-quality information to fight their disease."

Caris Molecular Intelligence, a service that correlates molecular data from a tumor with biomarker and drug associations from the latest clinical and scientific cancer literature, is the key technology platform used across the Network to enable the delivery of precision medicine. This information is used to help inform treatment decisions by identifying therapies that have the potential to be most effective and to rule out those that are less likely to work, based on the unique molecular characteristics of an individual patient's cancer. Caris Molecular Intelligence is a patented and proprietary offering that uses multiple technology platforms combined with sophisticated bioinformatics to develop clinically actionable reports for more than 100,000 clinical cases to date.

West Virginia University Health Sciences Vice President and School of Medicine Dean, Clay Marsh, M.D., is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of Caris Life Sciences.

About Caris Life Sciences®
Caris Life Sciences® is a leading biotechnology company focused on fulfilling the promise of precision medicine through quality and innovation. With more than 100,000 clinical cases, Caris Molecular Intelligence® (CMI), the company's patented and proprietary product offering, provides oncologists with the most clinically actionable treatment options available to personalize cancer care today. Caris Molecular Intelligence uses a variety of advanced profiling technologies to assess relevant biological changes in each patient's tumor. CMI then connects the biomarker data generated from the tumor with biomarker-drug associations supported by the evidence and in relevant clinical literature through the Company's proprietary bioinformatics rules engine. Since 2009, Caris Life Sciences has tracked clinical and outcome data for certain patients utilizing CMI, and has observed that patients treated with drugs consistent with CMI's recommendations based upon the patient's tumor profile show a significant increase in overall survival. The company is also developing its ADAPT Biotargeting System™, a revolutionary and unbiased profiling platform with applications across therapy development, drug delivery, advanced diagnostics and disease monitoring. Currently being developed for cancer and other complex diseases, the ADAPT Biotargeting System is able to simultaneously measure millions of molecular interactions within complex biological systems in their natural state(s). Headquartered in Irving, Texas, Caris Life Sciences offers services throughout the U.S., Europe, Australia and other international markets. To learn more, please visit www.CarisLifeSciences.com.

About West Virginia University Cancer Institute
The WVU Cancer Institute is the umbrella structure that encompasses all cancer-related efforts of West Virginia University, including its formal partners at regional cancer facilities, research labs in Morgantown, and statewide prevention and control programs. The Cancer Institute's mission is to provide excellent care to patients and their families while strengthening its research, education, and service programs to address the cancer health disparities unique to the state of West Virginia and Appalachia. To learn more about the WVU Cancer Institute, please visit wvucancer.org.

Media Inquiries:
Brian Stengle
Caris Life Sciences
Media Relations
[email protected]
214-294-5606

SOURCE Caris Life Sciences