TuBaFrost: European virtual tumor tissue banking

Establishment and maintenance of a standardized glioma tissue bank: Huashan experience

Cerebral glioma is the most common brain tumor as well as one of the top ten malignant tumors in human beings. In spite of the great progress on chemotherapy and radiotherapy as well as the surgery strategies during the past decades, the mortality and morbidity are still high. One of the major challenges is to explore the pathogenesis and invasion of glioma at various "omics" levels (such as proteomics or genomics) and the clinical implications of biomarkers for diagnosis, prognosis or treatment of glioma patients. Establishment of a standardized tissue bank with high quality biospecimens annotated with clinical information is pivotal to the solution of these questions as well as the drug development process and translational research on glioma. Therefore, based on previous experience of tissue banks, standardized protocols for sample collection and storage were developed. We also developed two systems for glioma patient and sample management, a local database for medical records and a local image database for medical images. For future set-up of a regional biobank network in Shanghai, we also founded a centralized database for medical records. Hence we established a standardized glioma tissue bank with sufficient clinical data and medical images in Huashan Hospital. By September, 2013, tissues samples from 1,326 cases were collected. Histological diagnosis revealed that 73 % were astrocytic tumors, 17 % were oligodendroglial tumors, 2 % were oligoastrocytic tumors, 4 % were ependymal tumors and 4 % were other central nervous system neoplasms.

The liver tissue bank and clinical database in China

To develop a standardized and well-rounded material available for hepatology research, the National Liver Tissue Bank (NLTB) Project began in 2008 in China to make well-characterized and optimally preserved liver tumor tissue and clinical database. From Dec 2008 to Jun 2010, over 3000 individuals have been enrolled as liver tumor donors to the NLTB, including 2317 cases of newly diagnosed hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and about 1000 cases of diagnosed benign or malignant liver tumors. The clinical database and sample store can be managed easily and correctly with the data management platform used. We believe that the high-quality samples with detailed information database will become the cornerstone of hepatology research especially in studies exploring the diagnosis and new treatments for HCC and other liver diseases.

Clinical features and outcomes of 25 patients with primary adenosquamous cell carcinoma of the prostate

The aim of the present study was to examine the epidemiology, natural history, treatment and long-term survival of patients with adenosquamous cell carcinoma of the prostate. The Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Program database was used to identify ASCC of prostate cases between January 1973 and December 2006. Survival probabilities were estimated using the Kaplan-Meier methods and compared using the log-rank test. A total of 25 patients with adenosquamous cell carcinoma of the prostate were identified during the study period. The median age was 74 years (range 53–98). Twenty percent of study subjects presented with metastatic disease. Among those patients with known grade (n=16), 75% had poorly or undifferentiated histology. A total of 40% of study subjects received radical prostatectomy, while 24% of the patients had primary radiation therapy. The 1-, 3-, and 5-year cancer specific survival rates for the entire cohort were 55.2%, 37.8%, and 30.3%, respectively. For patients who underwent prostatectomy, the 1-, 3-, and 5-year survival rates were 78%, 78%, and 63%, respectively. For the patients who did not receive prostatectomy, the 1-year survival rates were 38.7% and none survived to three years. Adenosquamous cell carcinoma is a rare aggressive subtype of prostate cancer with poor cancer specific survival. The development of new therapeutic approaches for this aggressive tumor is urgently needed.

Molecular determinants of outcomes: linking tissue banks to outcomes databases

In the past, most outcomes research has focused on defining the clinicopathological determinants of outcomes. More recently, it has become apparent that the molecular features of tumor (as well as the genetic makeup of the patient) significantly influence outcomes, including responsiveness to therapy and prognosis. In view of this, there is a need for more research on the molecular determinants of outcomes. Research biorepositories are important vehicles for this type of research and they could potentially accelerate this work. For biomarker research to affect patient care, it is critical to effectively link patient outcomes data with descriptions of the molecular features of tumors. Effective linkage of outcomes data with tissue banks will dramatically accelerate biomarker research.