Video Marketing to recruit Lymphoma PTCL Clinical Trials

Posted on July 9, 2011 by Daedalus

One of the trends we continue to see is the increased use of video for physician education, clinical trial recruitment and providing of healthcare information. Video lends itself well to a marketing strategy, not only does it engage on a personal level but facilitates the explanation of complex information.

Sally Church on Pharma Strategy Blog highlights the social media strategy and video by Dr Anas Younes (@DrAnasYounes) from MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, TX.

As Sally notes, “slowly but surely, we are seeing more use of social media in one area where I really think it can help a lot – clinical trials.”

Dr Younes’ video explains the opportunity to participate in clinical trials with new agents to treat Peripheral T-Cell Lymphoma (PTCL), a rare blood disease.

It is a short video well worth watching and forwarding on to others.

Why combine MET and EGFR inhibitors in Gastric Cancer?

Posted on April 13, 2011 by Daedalus

That’s the question that Icarus Consultants’ oncology expert, Sally Church, Ph.D answers on Pharma Strategy Blog.

In an insightful post about “New mechanisms of resistance to MET inhibition,” Sally discusses research by Jeffrey Engelman, Jie Que and colleagues from Mass General recently published in the AACR journal, Cancer Discovery.

Gastric cancer cells have been observed to have an “oncogene addiction” to MET, so impairing or inactivating MET provides a rational for targeted therapies.

However, given that cancer calls can “escape” from an oncogene addiction through mutations or other pathways, combination therapies are often the approach to follow.

Sally proposes on Pharma Strategy Blog that “combining MET and EGFR inhibitors in gastric cancer may be a viable therapeutic strategy.”

Zebrafish as a platform for cancer gene discovery

Posted on March 31, 2011 by Daedalus

Icarus Consultants’ oncology new products guru, Sally Church, has published a fascinating post on Pharma Strategy Blog on how Zebrafish models of melanoma are providing new drug targets.

Sally discusses recent research published in Nature that shows the histone methyltransferase SETDB1 is an oncogene that accelerates melanoma formation in co-operation with BRAF(V600E).

What makes this research exciting is the potential of zebrafish as a platform for cancer gene discovery.

Icarus Consultants to attend EAU in Vienna

Posted on March 8, 2011 by Daedalus

Photo Werner Kunz via flickr

Icarus Consultants will be at the forthcoming European Urology Association annual meeting in Vienna, Austria from March 18-22, 2011.

If you are going to be in Vienna and would be interested in meeting up for Kaffee Und Kuchen, please contact us.

Incidentally, our favorite is a slice of Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte (Black Forest gateau).

Pharma Market Research – Best of ESOMAR, New York

Posted on February 23, 2011 by Daedalus

All those in the pharma/biotech industry who perform market research will be familiar with ESOMAR, the worldwide organization whose code of practice governs how we conduct market research.

So, we are pleased to be invited to the ESOMAR – Best of New York, 2011 event to be held at the offices of Microsoft in NYC, later today. Networking opportunities are always welcome, and Pieter Droppert from Icarus will be attending.

The meeting has four speakers covering a wide range of topics, including employing robots to mine twitter, and how to draw on the wisdom of crowds to generate winning concepts. It is good to have an opportunity to hear what other market research practitioners are doing outside of the pharma/biotech industry.

Information about the key opinion leader (KOL) market research services that Icarus Consultants offers can be found here.

Stromal endothelial cells are potential targets for new cancer drugs

Posted on February 9, 2011 by Daedalus

Sally Church on Pharma Strategy Blog discusses a recent paper from Science and Translational Medicine, in which new research shows that endothelial cells (fibroblasts, immune cells) actively participate in regulating the cancer tumor microenvironment.

Further insight on why stromal-cancer cross talk is becoming a hot-topic, can be found on Pharma Strategy Blog.