EBMT and EHA released the second call for retrospective research proposals within the Scientific Excellence Work Package of the GoCART Coalition at the beginning of August.
The aim of the call is to promote the use of existing Registry data and other sources of real world data and to strengthen collaborations across stakeholders in the field of CAR T-cell therapies.
The selection committee was composed by Prof Anna Sureda (President of the EBMT), Prof Christian Chabannon (Past Chair EBMT Cellular Therapies and Immunobiology Working Party), Prof. John Gribben (Past President of the EHA), Prof. Martin Dreyling (Board Member of EHA) and Natacha Bolaños (Chair EBMT Patient Advocacy Committee).
This second call for retrospective research proposals has been very competitive; out of the 16 scientific projects that were presented, three of them were selected by the selection committee:
“Impact of preceding therapy on the feasibility, safety and efficacy of anti-CD19 CAR-T cells in acute lymphoblastic leukemia” (co-PIs: Valentín Ortiz-Maldonado, Hospital Clínic, Barcelona, Spain and Sebastian Giebel, Maria Sklodowska-Curie National Research Institute of Oncology, Gliwice Branch, Poland),
“Efficacy and toxicity of CAR T cell therapy in patients with primary and secondary central nervous system lymphoma. A Retrospective Analysis of the Lymphoma WP of the EBMT” (PI: Anna Laube, Helios Klinikum Berlin, Germany)
“Infections following CAR-T therapy. A retrospective collaborative study between the IDWP, CTIWP, TCWP of the EBMT, the European Hematology Association (EHA), and the Medical College of Wisconsin” (PI: Dina Averbuch, Hadassah University Hospital, Jerusalem, Israel).
Big congratulations to the winners! Results of these analyses will certainly advance the field of cellular therapy.
Scientific research on gene and cellular therapies increased substantially over the last years. With Real World Data becoming increasingly available, many scientific questions, from different perspectives, can be explored. GoCART wants to maximize the use of data collected in the central Registry as well as data available to other stakeholders, and to facilitate further collaboration between stakeholders.
The 16 proposals were evaluated against four criteria: scientific impact, novelty, collaboration across stakeholders and feasibility of the proposal. EBMT is economically supporting the selected studies by providing the required resources to conduct them in a competitive manner.
There will be more opportunities in the future for interested researchers in the field. Please … stay tuned, next call will be opened in May 2023 with results being released before summer 2023!