Strip the platelet coat off travelling tumour cells in ctDNA-positive patients
Cancer cells in the blood wrap themselves in platelets as camouflage. Aspirin may remove that cloak, and it is cheapest to test in the patients at highest risk of relapse.
Platelet cloaking shields circulating tumour cells from natural killer cells and shear stress and supplies TGF-beta that drives epithelial-mesenchymal transition. Aspirin has adjuvant signals in PIK3CA-pathway-mutant colorectal cancer and is being tested at scale in unselected populations, but no trial has enriched for molecular residual disease, where the event rate is high and the biology is precisely platelet-tumour cell interaction.
- Metastasis is understood least and studied last · Metastasis causes about nine in ten cancer deaths but gets a small fraction of research money and almost no trials of its own.
- Dormant cells and minimal residual disease · After a 'successful' treatment, cells can sleep for years then relapse. We can barely detect them and cannot target them.
- No incentive to repurpose cheap drugs · Old, cheap drugs with anti-cancer signals never get the trials they need because no one profits from the result.
Pages like this
not linked directly; found by shared links- IdeaCheap perioperative beta-blocker plus anti-inflammatory to blunt surgical stress
Shares Epithelial–mesenchymal transition & drug efflux, No incentive to repurpose cheap drugs, Metastasis is understood least and studied last, MRD / molecular residual disease testing.
- IdeactDNA-guided adjuvant therapy as the default in stage II-III colon cancer
Shares DYNAMIC, CIRCULATE-Japan (GALAXY / VEGA / ALTAIR), Metastasis is understood least and studied last, Dormant cells and minimal residual disease.
- IdeaPerioperative beta-blocker plus COX-2 inhibitor to reduce metastasis after surgery
Shares No incentive to repurpose cheap drugs, Metastasis is understood least and studied last, HR-positive / HER2-negative breast cancer, Colorectal cancer.
- IdeaA blood test for the pre-metastatic niche
Shares Metastasis is understood least and studied last, Dormant cells and minimal residual disease, Liquid biopsy (ctDNA), HR-positive / HER2-negative breast cancer.
- IdeaBreak the neutrophil DNA nets that catch tumour cells after surgery
Shares Metastasis is understood least and studied last, Dormant cells and minimal residual disease, MRD / molecular residual disease testing, Liquid biopsy (ctDNA).
- IdeaFormally qualify tumour-DNA blood tests as a surrogate endpoint for adjuvant trials
Shares DYNAMIC, CIRCULATE-Japan (GALAXY / VEGA / ALTAIR), Dormant cells and minimal residual disease, MRD / molecular residual disease testing.
- IdeaBlock the recycling that keeps dormant cells alive
Shares No incentive to repurpose cheap drugs, Dormant cells and minimal residual disease, MRD / molecular residual disease testing, Liquid biopsy (ctDNA).
- IdeaBlunt the inflammation that wakes sleeping cancer cells
Shares Metastasis is understood least and studied last, Dormant cells and minimal residual disease, MRD / molecular residual disease testing, HR-positive / HER2-negative breast cancer.