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Cancer survivor Drew Lyall is now CEO of BioCanRx, a network that will speed the development of biotherapeutic cancer treatments – from laboratory discoveries to manufacturing to industry sponsorship to clinical trials – all to improve outcomes for cancer patients.

“Every one of us knows someone, a close friend or family member, who has been diagnosed with cancer,” said Drew Lyall. “But it still comes as a shock when that someone turns out to be you.”

When he found out the melanoma that he thought had been vanquished had returned at Stage 4, his thoughts “immediately dove into the dark hole of, ‘How am I going to tell my kids they may lose their father? How am I going to tell my parents they may have to bury their son?'”

Now, instead of grim endings, Lyall is imagining a better future for all cancer patients, when treatments require no need for radiation or chemotherapy.

“Imagine a time when I can be given a vaccine derived from my specific cancer cells that would give me permanent remission,” said Lyall, now CEO of the first national Network of Excellence devoted to cancer research. Called Biotherapeutics for Cancer Treatment, or BioCanRx for short, the network was announced in December and will be hosted at The Ottawa Hospital.

BioCanRx “will help us realize the real potential of using biotherapies to fight cancer, so we don’t have to imagine these things anymore,” said Lyall.

“Biotherapeutics hold great promise because they have the potential to completely eliminate even advanced cancers with far fewer side effects than many of our current treatments,” said Dr. John Bell, scientific director of BioCanRx and senior scientist at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute.

Biologically based therapeutics, which include oncolytic viruses, immune cells and synthetic antibodies, are among the most promising cancer treatments to emerge over the last decade. While different biotherapeutics (also called immunotherapy) function in different ways, one thing they have in common is the ability to mobilize and activate the body’s natural defence mechanisms to attack cancer cells.

The network will enable more than 40 Canadian scientists to work together to develop several therapeutic strategies in parallel, and then test these both alone and in combination. The goal is to find “the most effective way to help our bodies’ own defences fight cancer,” added Dr. Bell, also a professor with the University of Ottawa’s Faculty of Medicine.

BioCanRx will also involve cancer patients and their families, keeping them up-to-date about developments, seeking their perceptions of the risks and benefits of different therapeutic approaches, and asking for feedback about participation in clinical trials — all to help determine which treatments will have the greatest impact on survival and quality of life.

“As a survivor, I can’t wait to see what their incredible collaboration will accomplish,” Lyall said about Dr. Bell’s team.

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