UCLH is to play a lead role in delivery of the Prime Minister’s 100,000 Genome Project which aims to position the UK as the first country in the world to sequence 100,000 whole human genomes.
The trust is part of a partnership with other trusts in north London which will work together to create the North Thames Genomics Medicine Centre.
The centre will recruit patients to this pioneering study which will ultimately support the delivery of more personalised diagnosis and targeted therapy for patients with cancer and rare diseases. It is anticipated about 75,000 people will be involved of which 40,000 will be patients with a serious illness. The aim is to help researchers and clinicians better understand and treat rare and inherited diseases and common cancers.
Led by Great Ormond Street Hospital, the other trusts involved in the partnership are Barts Health NHS Trust, London North West Healthcare (LNWH), Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust (RFL)and UCLH. UCLH is leading on the cancer component of the new centre
Patients receiving care at all hospitals in the centre will be identified and asked for consent to provide blood samples for genetic analysis.
Our BRC was one of the pilot centres sequencing the genetic codes of people with cancer or rare diseases, in a series of cross-BRC initiatives, with the clinical research facilities at UCLH, Great Ormond Street and Moorfields Hospitals and with the BRCs at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust, Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust and Guys and St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust.
Our BRC is also one of the sites involved in the National Institute for Health Research Health Informatics Collaboration (HIC), a major new programme to allow collaborative sharing of routinely collected NHS data to facilitate more effective clinical research and open up possibilities for linking routine health data with genomics data. HIC, together with the GEL project, should provide a powerful database for future research.
Today’s announcement means a larger number of patients who are receiving care and treatment in the North Thames region through all the partners will be involved in the rare diseases component of the study, which will start recruiting in the first quarter of 2015. Samples collected at UCLH, Barts and LNWH will also focus on the study and diagnosis of common cancers with a view to improving treatment.
Professor Lyn Chitty, clinical lead for North Thames Genomic Medicine Centre and the North Thames Clinical Research Network and a UCLH clinician, said:
“This is a really exciting project and offers a great opportunity. We hope that by doing whole genome sequencing we will identify the underlying genetic cause for some rare diseases as well as potentially highlighting new treatments for cancer patients through a better understanding of the cause of their disease.
“In the longer term, this is a project that stands to transform the NHS. Ultimately, if we can make it affordable and efficient enough, whole genome sequencing could be used as one of the first lines of investigation to help clinicians diagnose diseases more quickly and without the need for numerous other tests, as well as identifying the most appropriate treatment.”
The North Thames Genomics Medicine Centre builds on an existing and established collaboration through UCLPartners. The partnership supports a diverse population of over six million people and has proven delivery of genetic samples, established consent protocols. It is well positioned to fulfil its role in the 100,000 Genome Project.
