Clinical trial activity in Victoria

Cancer Council Victoria has been supporting clinical trials research since 1977 and provides grants to over 20 hospitals throughout Victoria to conduct clinical trials. Our Clinical Trials Office facilitates collaborative clinical research by working closely with Victorian Cooperative Oncology Group (VCOG) members to develop clinical trials. We also provide information about current clinical trials being conducted throughout Victoria and administer the funding scheme that gives grants to hospitals so they can offer trials to their patients.

In 2007, 22 cancer treatment centres in Victoria were invited to participate in our Cancer Trials Management Scheme that's operated since 1988. The scheme distributes about $830,000 to cancer trial centres in the state
The Department of Human Services Cancer and Palliative Care Department, via the Victorian Cancer Agency, contributed around $200,000 to be distributed via the scheme. The remaining funds were a contribution from Cancer Council Victoria
450 trials were reported as open to recruitment in 2007 and a further 750 trials were not active but had patients on follow-up
Across the trials open to recruitment, a total of 1809 new patients were entered into clinical trials in 2007. This was an 11.75% increase from 2006
Of the new patients entered into clinical trials, 11% were from rural sites (203 patients) with the remaining majority from Metropolitan treatment centres
The percentage of patients participating in clinical trial follow-up in rural vs metropolitan centres is very similar to that of new recruits. Rural areas of the state contribute 10% of patients currently on follow up while metropolitan centres, again, contribute the majority
The most current figure for cancer incidence in Victoria comes from 2005 data. The number of new participants recruited in 2007 represent 7.4% of total 2005 cancer incidence.

How do you know if a clinical trial is safe and worthwhile?

Every clinical trial in Victoria, and Australia for that matter, must be approved and monitored by a Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC). A HREC is an independent committee of doctors, statisticians and community representatives, amongst others, who ensure the risks of a clinical trial are as low as possible and are worth any potential benefit.

They also ensure the trial is ethical and that the rights of study participants are being protected. Ethics committees protect the welfare and rights of participants by ensuring all aspects of a clinical trial comply with the National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research. The National Statement was published by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) in 2007 and its purpose is simply to 'promote ethically good human research'.

The Australian Health Ethics Committee provides support to Victorian Hospital HRECs to be able to review and approve research appropriately. For more information see http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/health_ethics/index.htm.

Who decides to start a trial in Victoria and how do they select the research topic?

Victoria is home to many cancer experts and many of them sit on one or more of the Victorian Cooperative Oncology Group’s (VCOG) cancer committees. Over 450 health professionals make up the VCOG membership and they are involved in all aspects of cancer care including starting and supporting clinical trials.

There are many types of clinical trials but the main focus here is on treatment trials. Treatment trials are usually started in 1 of 3 ways:

a pharmaceutical company develops a promising new medication and wants to make it available to the public. Before this can happen, it must be thoroughly tested in clinical trials
a specialist cancer doctor or scientist develops a new treatment in a laboratory and after it passes a number of tests in the laboratory wants to test the new treatment on humans in a hospital setting.
a cancer specialist (medical oncologist, radiation oncologist, surgeon) is interested in testing an already approved cancer medication, device, treatment or technique on a different type of cancer. Or they are testing existing treatments in new combinations with each other. They may also be testing an approved treatment at an earlier or later point in time during the patient's cancer treatment.

Is there a database showing clinical trials going on in Victoria at the moment?

The Cancer Council Victoria along with the Victorian Cancer Agency have set up a database containing information about breast cancer clinical trials that are currently being conducted in Victoria. In the future there are plans to create additional databases of Victorian clinical trials for other types of cancer as well. Visit our clinical trials page for more information.

The World Health Organisation has a web portal site that performs searches on some of the major clinical trial registries. This can be found at http://www.who.int/ictrp/search/en/index.html Please note the search process and results pages are tailored more toward health professionals than potential participants.

National public health funding bodies, such as the National Health & Medical Research Council (NHMRC), collaborative trial groups, cancer charities such as Cancer Council Victoria, academic institutions, hospitals and pharmaceutical companies all fund clinical trials. Often a clinical trial has received funding from more than one of these organisations.

Contact the Clinical Trials Office - trials@cancervic.org.au or phone +61 (0)3 9635 5179.