Whether or not bone cancer spreads to the lungs could mean life or death for a child. And yet, we still don’t know why and how some bone cancers spread. But with your support, Dr. Michael Monument is exploring these vital questions.
As an orthopaedic cancer surgeon and EXpAT researcher, specializing in the diagnosis and management of malignant pediatric bone cancer, Dr. Monument is extremely interested in how bone cancers metastasize (spread) to the lung.
Using high-end genetic sequencing and imaging technology, Dr. Monument’s research group is studying different human bone cancer models to understand and characterize the common genetic and molecular factors responsible for lung metastases. He and his research team are employing a unique strategy to simultaneously assess the molecular changes that take place in tumour cells and in host lung tissue during the evolution of lung metastases.
Identifying these crucial pro-metastatic pathways is vital to recognizing high-risk patients earlier, while also paving the way for new, targeted therapies. Given the poor survival rate for sarcoma patients who develop lung metastases, new strategies to prevent and impede lung metastases are essential to save young lives.
With your support, in 2014, we completed our $2.5-million commitment to the ExpAT program.
Dr. Monument is an orthopaedic oncology surgeon in the Department of Surgery at the University of Calgary’s Cumming School of Medicine. To learn more about the research initiatives of the Experimental and Applied Therapeutics program at the University of Calgary click here.