Barbara Guinn is an EACR member who recently shared a success story that was made possible thanks to the resources she receives with her EACR membership.
Barbara, alongside Kelly Grayson and Alice Fearn, had been working on a project to identify and characterise biomarkers for the early non-invasive detection of ovarian cancer in their lab at the University of Hull.
“We would still be stuck without samples, if it wasn’t for the EACR.”
Despite having successfully secured local research ethics committee approval for a study to look for biomarkers in patient samples in October 2018, they had been unable to obtain any samples.
They decided to use the ‘Find a Collaboration‘ tool in their EACR membership resources to place an advert asking for people who wanted to work with them to get in touch.
“We had a great response,” says Barbara, “20 research groups around the world have asked how they could help, from Turkey, Iran, Ghana, Portugal, Belgium, Romania and the UK.”
They connected with one of the EACR members who contacted them, and modified their existing ethics to add a resulting six gynaecology groups around the UK, and recruitment of patients to their clinical trial started on 19 October 2023.
Barbara commented “We would still be stuck without samples, if it wasn’t for the EACR.”
They would like to give a special thanks to Dr Neil Ryan, RCOG subspeciality trainee in Gynaecology Oncology at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and a CSO/NES Clinical Lecturer at the University of Edinburgh for his unwavering support of this project, and Ann Doust, Research Portfolio Manager for Professor Andrew Horne at the University of Edinburgh, for getting their ethics amendments over the finishing line.
EACR members, share your success stories with us! ️
When you achieve something positive using the tools, resources and opportunities you receive with your EACR membership, please reach out! We’d love to feature your story to inspire other members and showcase the benefits of being a part of the EACR community.
Email your story and and accompanying pictures and link to Sam Kirk, our Communications and Social Media Coordinator: samantha.kirk@eacr.org
