Cancer Clinical Trials in Canada

Cancer and its treatments often result in severe toxicities and side effects that, over the course of treatment, results in weight loss and depletion of key nutrients. Loss of muscle mass and strength during cancer treatment is a critical problem because it negatively affects patient response and tolerance to therapy and post-treatment recovery. To restore the nutritional status, it is imperative to stimulate muscle protein anabolism. Eggs are high quality protein source, popular and well tolerated by cancer patients. Therefore, the objective of this study is to determine whether a nutritional intervention of ≥2 eggs can aid in restoring nutritional status and improving immune function and quality of life of cancer patients' post-treatment. It is an 8- week randomised clinical trial with parallel arm assignment. Half of the participants will receive the nutritional intervention (Early Intervention) and the other half will be on standard of care or usual diet for first 4 weeks. Starting from week 5, all participants will receive the nutrition intervention till week 8 (Delayed Intervention). Dietary intake (foods and nutrients), cumulative protein intake (g protein/kg body weight), immunological measures, physical performance and quality of life has been planned to be assessed over time and between groups to evaluate the feasibility of an egg intervention in meeting recommended protein intakes for patients with cancer. Read Less

Prospective cohort study of patients receiving standard-care radiotherapy is paramount to a better understanding of radiation effects and longterm outcomes. The primary objective is to determine the feasibility of establishing infrastructure to systematically collect clinical data, patient-reported outcomes, and imaging data from daily radiotherapy practice. Secondary objectives are to provide a control cohort for comparative effectiveness research of investigational interventions through a cmRCT design; compare imaging features with clinical outcomes; understand dose-effect relationships; quantify imaging quality metrics. Read Less

Currently available fiducial marker and fiducial insertion strategies are rudimentary, imprecise, not compatible with multiple insertion catheters/needles and are overall unreliable. STING-MARK device is the first universal, fully detachable and non-premounted radiopaque fiducial device system. Allowing biopsy prior to insertion, STING-MARK is easily and reliably delivered through-the-needle to the tumor, in order to accurately pinpoint its location for image-guided therapies. This study aims at establishing proof of concept for STING-MARK, by demonstrating its usability, reproducibility, radio-opacity and retention in a variety of clinically-relevant ex vivo organ samples. Read Less

The primary aim is to test whether abatacept, as compared to placebo, is associated with a reduction in major adverse cardiac events (MACE) among participants hospitalized with myocarditis secondary to an immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI). The primary outcome, MACE, is a composite of first occurrence of cardiovascular death, non-fatal sudden cardiac arrest, cardiogenic shock, significant ventricular arrythmias, significant bradyarrythmias, or incident heart failure. Read Less

Maitake is an edible mushroom that is used for both its nutritional and medicinal properties. Human and animal studies have shown Maitake may help improve immune function; however, its effectiveness in people with cancer is not clear. The investigators aim to measure if Maitake has any immunomodulatory effects when given alongside conventional systemic cancer therapy. Read Less

This pilot clinical trial aims to assess the real world quality of life and survival of patients treated with targeted therapy that has preliminary evidence of efficacy in subjects with advanced rare cancers or cancer harbouring rare molecular aberrations. The treatment has been granted conditional or full approved by Health Canada (HC) as effective and safe. Due to the rarity of the cancer or molecular aberration the uncertainty level of the health technology assessment (HTA) by the pan Canadian Oncology Review (pCODR) was too high for consideration of funding or it was not submitted for consideration. Consequently, the goal of this study is to generate real world evidence to support HTA decision making throughout the life cycle of the product. Read Less

This pilot clinical trial aims to assess the real world quality of life and survival of patients treated with therapy that has preliminary evidence of efficacy but uncertainty of the magnitude of clinical benefit or cost effectiveness in subjects with cancer. The goal of this study is to collect real world evidence with respect to quality of life and outcomes to support decision making. Read Less

The objective of this protocol is to develop an institution-wide liquid biopsy protocol that will establish a common process for collecting blood and corresponding archived tumor specimens for future research studies at the University Health Network's Princess Margaret Cancer Centre. Circulating cell-free nucleic acids (cfNA), including cell-free DNA (cfDNA) and cell-free RNA (cfRNA), are non-invasive, real-time biomarkers that can provide diagnostic and prognostic information before cancer diagnosis, during cancer treatment, and at disease progression. Cancer research scientists and clinicians at the Princess Margaret are interested in incorporating the collection of peripheral blood samples ("liquid biopsies") into research protocols as a means of non-invasively assessing tumor progression and response to treatment at multiple time points during a patient's course of disease. Read Less

The goal of this clinical trial is to test CPO301, a type of drug called an antibody drug conjugate in adult patients with advanced or metastatic solid tumors. The main questions it aims to answer are: * To assess the safety and tolerability of CPO301 at increasing doses and determine the dose to be used in the second part of the study (Part A) * To assess the safety and tolerability of CPO301 at the dose determined to be safe and tolerable in Part A in patients with Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer and potentially other tumor types (Part B) * To evaluate how quickly CPO301 is metabolized by the body (pharmacokinetics or PK) * To evaluate if antibodies to the study drug develop (immunogenicity) * To evaluate preliminary efficacy to the drug * To correlate preliminary efficacy with mutations in a biomarker called EGFR Participants will: * Provide written informed consent * Undergo screening tests to ensure they are eligible for study treatment * Attend all required study visits and receive CPO301 by intravenous injection every 3 weeks until the study doctor determines study treatment should be stopped, based on how well a participant is doing on treatment * Be followed for progression every 3 months for up to 2 years Read Less

Every year, new molecular agents enter the market with more and more patients receiving these treatments, especially in the metastatic setting. These molecular agents could correspond to immunotherapy and modulators of signaling pathways. More than 50% of cancer patients will receive radiation therapy during the course of their illness, including radiotherapy aimed a palliating symptoms secondary to metastatic diseases. Therefore, there will be an increasing number of patients who will be receiving radiotherapy while they are still receiving molecular agents. A better understanding of the interaction of these two treatment modalities is needed. Read Less

Pediatric, adolescent and young adult cancer survivors (PAYA-CS) are at higher risk of cardiovascular (CV) morbidity and mortality. This is a consequence of prior cancer-related therapies that have the potential of producing cardiac dysfunction, reducing cardiorespiratory fitness (reduced VO2peak) and psychosocial morbidities (i.e., anxiety and depression). A reduction of physical activity levels can evoke functional limitations resulting in a vicious cycle of reduced exercise tolerance and physical deterioration. To date, there is limited evidence on the use of non-pharmacological strategies such as Cardio-Oncology Rehabilitation (CORE) including structured exercise, behavioural support and risk factor management to improve the outcomes of this underserved population. The HIMALAYAS study is a randomized controlled trial designed to evaluate the impact of a CORE intervention (consisting of six-months home and onsite-based structured moderate to high-intensity aerobic exercise training and CVD risk factor management) on CV and psychosocial health, and the cardiovascular disease risk in PAYA-CS with mild heart dysfunction (stage B heart failure) compared to standard of care (i.e. providing guidance on the current exercise recommendations for cancer survivors). The primary objective of the HIMALAYAS study is to determine whether a six-month supervised CORE intervention, consisting of individualized moderate to high-intensity aerobic exercise training, CVD risk factor modification and enhanced online behavioral support, improves cardiorespiratory fitness (VO2peak; primary outcome), cardiac function, CVD risk factors and biomarkers, and patient-reported outcomes (PROs) at six- months follow-up compared to standard of care (CON) in PAYA-CS with stage B heart failure. The secondary objective is to assess the same outcomes at 12- and 24-months follow-up. We will recruit 336 patients across 5 sites in Canada and upto 134 patients at UHN in 3 years and conclude in 6 years. Read Less

This study is being done to help further understand how MR-guided adaptive RT in conjunction with the Integrated Magnetic Resonance Linear Accelerator (MRL) can improve patient outcomes. This study will include participants who will be receiving radiotherapy using the MRL machine to target their cancer more precisely. Participants will be asked to have a few extra MR scans taken during their RT planning and to complete a few quality of life questionnaires. Read Less