The Prostate Cancer Centre is a collaborative institution that together with the Southern Alberta Institute of Urology brings together physicians, nurses and researcher who focus on genitourinary function and disorders.  This environment is key not only for the multidisciplinary approach to the treatment of patients but also for the cutting edge research that takes place. The research department at the Centre began operation in 1999. Multiple national and international studies have been conducted at the Centre over the past 20 years.

Current Clinical Trials

Below is a list of the studies for which we are currently recruiting patients. For additional information on these studies please feel free to contact our research team at 403.943.8953.

GURC: Genitourinary Research Consortium, a multicenter study to document the course of advanced prostate cancer in Canada in terms of disease progression, real-world treatment, and patient management – click here for more information.

APCaRI 05 (Clarity Dx Validation Study): Validation of a new blood test to refine the prediction of clinically significant prostate cancer – click here for more information.

APCaRI 03: A prospective cohort study for men with a prior diagnosis of prostate cancer, to evaluate and validate potential biomarkers that would help in the clinical management of prostate cancer – click here for more information

PCO: Prostate Cancer Outcomes Global Initiative aims to significantly improve the quality of care and patient-centered outcomes in men with localised prostate cancer – click here for more information.

Prevalence: Biomarker study to determine the frequency of DNA-repair defects in men with metastatic Hormone Sensitive prostate cancer – click here for more information.

DAROL: Darolutamide observational study for men with non-metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (nmCRPC) – click here for more information.

Proteus: A randomized, placebo-controlled study of Apalutamide in patients with high-risk, localized or locally advanced prostate cancer who are candidates for radical prostatectomy – click here for more information.

Amplitude: A randomized, placebo-controlled, study of Niraparib in combination with Abiraterone Acetate and Prednisone versus Abiraterone Acetate and Prednisone for the treatment of men with deleterious germline or somatic homologous recombination repair (HRR) gene-mutated metastatic castration sensitive prostate cancer (mCSPC) – click here for more information.

AURORAX: An observational prospective multicenter diagnostics test cohort study for detection of renal cell carcinoma recurrence after primary surgery *NEW*– click here for more information

Talapro-3: A randomized study of talazoparib with enzalutamide vs. placebo with enzalutamide in patients with DDR gene mutated metastatic castration sensitive prostate cancer (mCSPC) *NEW* – click here for more information

GAP1 meets GAP3: A research study for men who are not receiving any active treatment for their prostate cancer (active surveillance). This study aims to evaluate the biomarkers in urine samples to examine the presence of prostate cancer as well as determining how aggressive the cancer is *COMING SOON* – click here for more information.

Ongoing Clinical Trials

EMBARK: Study of Enzalutamide plus Leuprolide, Enzalutamide Monotherapy and placebo plus Leuprolide in men with high-risk non-metastatic prostate cancer progressing after definitive therapy – click here for more information

TITAN: Apalutamide plus Androgen Deprivation Therapy (ADT) versus ADT alone in subjects with metastatic hormone sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC) – click here for more information

PROpel: A randomized, placebo-controlled study of Olaparib plus Abiraterone relative to placebo plus Abiraterone as first-line therapy in men with metastatic castration resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) – click here for more information

SPARTAN: A randomized, placebo-controlled study of ARN-509 (apalutamide) in men with non-metastatic castration resistant prostate cancer (nmCRPC) – click here for more information

Enzamet: Enzalutamide as 1st line therapy for men with hormone sensitive metastatic prostate cancer (mHSPC) – click here for more information

APCaRI 01: The evaluation of potential biomarkers to help in the clinical management of prostate cancer – click here for more information

Darolutamide Roll Over Study: An open-label, single arm, roll-over study to provide continued treatment with Darolutamide for participants who were enrolled in previous studies – click here for more information

Quest: A study of Niraparib combination therapies for the treatment of metastatic castration resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) – click here for more information

Prostate Cancer Related Definitions

Metastatic cancer is cancer that has spread from the part of the body where it started (the primary site) to other parts of the body. When cancer cells break away from a tumor, they can travel to other parts of the body through the bloodstream or the lymph system

Non-metastatic cancer has not spread from the primary site (the place where it started) to other places in the body

De novo cancer means that cancer has spread to other parts of the body when it was previously undiagnosed, meaning the cancer is metastatic from the start

Prostate cancer with local metastasis means that cancer has spread to other organs within the pelvis, which usually means the nearby lymph nodes. However, this type includes any organ or structure in the pelvis. Distant metastasis means that prostate cancer has spread beyond the pelvis

Advanced cancer is a term used to describe cancer that is unlikely to be cured

Biomarkers are molecules that indicate a normal or abnormal process taking place in your body and may be a sign of an underlying condition or disease. Various types of molecules, such as DNA (genes), proteins, or hormones, can serve as biomarkers

Metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC) describes men who have metastatic prostate cancer and have never received (ie. are sensitive to) androgen deprivation therapy (ADT)

Castrate resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) is defined by disease progression despite treatment with androgen deprivation therapy (ADT).  It may present as either a continuous rise in serum prostate specific antigen (PSA) levels, the progression of pre-existing disease, and/or the appearance of new metastases

Metastatic castrate sensitive prostate cancer (mCSPC) is cancer that has spread beyond the prostate area. It can be controlled by lowering the amount of testosterone in the body with androgen deprivation therapy (ADT)

Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA) tests measures the amount of PSA in the blood. PSA is found in abnormally high concentrations in the blood of men with prostate cancer

Androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) is a hormone therapy for prostate cancer.  Prostate cancer cannot grow or survive without androgens, which include testosterone and other male hormones. ADT decreases the amount of androgens in a man’s body

PARP inhibitors (PARPi) are precision cancer medications. PARP is a protein found in our cells, it helps damaged cells to repair themselves.  PARP inhibitor drugs block PARP, meaning that the cancer cells are not able to repair themselves and they die

Please use the contact form below if you would like us to contact you about research activities at the Prostate Cancer Centre.

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Tissue
Banking

The Prostate Cancer Centre has teamed up with the Alberta Cancer Research Biorepository (formerly the cbcf Tumor Bank) for the collection of blood, tissue, urine and semen samples from patients with and at risk of developing cancer.  The Tumor Bank has been collecting tissue and blood samples for many years from patients with both cancerous and benign lesions.  Within the Prostate Cancer Centre, the cbcf Tumor Bank focuses on the collection of blood, urine and semen from men currently being followed in our Active Surveillance Program.  However, tissue collection is not limited to prostate cancer alone or specifically to the Active Surveillance program.

The samples collected are stored anonymously and provided to researchers around the world for the development of new treatment and diagnostic tools for cancer.  If you are interested in donating to the program, please visit their website or contact our Centre at 403.943.8888 for more information.

Translational Research

A lot of work must be done before a drug can be released to the public, or even tested on humans.  Much of this work is done in laboratories and is referred to as bench or basic research.  The application of this bench or basic science to real life treatment of patients is referred to as translational research (the translation of the laboratory results to meaningful medical practice).

We are pleased to have Dr. Tarek Bismar join our group and bring his expertise in genetic research to our centre.  Dr. Bismar will be focusing on translational research at the center and is a renowned genitourinary pathologist with a special interest in prostate cancer research.  He has completed fellowship training is in genitourinary pathology at Harvard University and Wayne State.

APCaRI

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The Alberta Prostate Cancer Research Initiative (APCaRI) brings together a multi-disciplinary team of prostate cancer scientists, physicians, patients, healthcare employees and an international collaborative network together to positively impact the outcomes and quality of life of those living with prostate cancer by accelerating the translation of new research ideas from the laboratory to the clinic.

Prostate Cancer Registry & Biorepository

Clinical registries improve care by arming doctors and teams treating prostate cancer with information about how their outcomes compare with international standards and other locales. The Alberta Prostate Cancer Registry will allow us to monitor the patterns of care and outcomes of men diagnosed with prostate cancer throughout Alberta, and provide a valuable tool to track how our translational research efforts are impacting outcomes over time. The registry will be linked to a biorepository containing patient specimens that will drive translational research and enable personalized approaches to prostate cancer diagnosis and treatment.

APCaRI team members are applying state-of-the-art genomic, proteomic, metabolomic and transcriptomic analyses to the development of new and better tests for prostate cancer. Clinical validation of these tests requires large numbers of high quality patient biosamples linked to accurate and complete clinical outcome data. Despite growing international efforts to improve biobanking, there is limited availability of high-quality biospecimens linked to well-annotated prospectively collected demographic and clinical information.

The APCaRI Prostate Cancer Registry and Biorepository is a province-wide comprehensive resource that incorporates all prostate cancer patients in Alberta. Biobanking samples from Albertan prostate cancer patients collected through the journey of diagnosis and treatment will translate into enormous benefits because it will lead to tests that are directly applicable to Albertans. Translation of these tests to the clinic within 5 years will have a considerable impact on patients and the healthcare system.

Learn more about APCaRI.