Lisa Park was 48 when she was admitted to A&E in 2019 with worsening bouts of abdominal pain. Her eventual diagnosis was unexpected. She was told she was suffering from gallbladder cancer, a rare but serious condition that usually only affects people in old age.
Park – who is married and lives in Edinburgh – was recently asked to join a revolutionary UK research programme known as. It has has been set up to target individuals with rare tumours in the hope that drugs licensed for more common cancers could be appropriated as a new treatment. Rare cancers’ total impact on the health service is therefore significant but there are few treatments currently available to help patients. Determine has been set up to find if drugs that are already prescribed by doctors for more common types of cancer could benefit patients with rare cancers for which they have not been licensed.Research UK Centre for Drug Development, and involves several other leading medical centres in the UK. The ultimate aim is to match old drugs for new cancers.