BLADDER

CANCER

TRANSLATIONAL

RESEARCH

MEETING 2021

The University of Birmingham and King’s Health Partners are organising their second Bladder Cancer Translational Research Meeting - a fully interactive bladder cancer clinical research meeting led by a wide international expert panel of clinicians and scientists in the U.K. The forum is designed to bridge the gap between science and clinical practice and will cover the spectrum of bladder cancer research in oncology, urology, nursing, epidemiology, immuno- and molecular biology.

Despite the substantial disease burden for patients and healthcare providers, bladder cancer only receives 0.6% of cancer research spending. This meeting will thus provide an opportunity to enhance collaborations across the UK and internationally and allow networking opportunities between clinicians and scientists allowing participants to anticipate crucial observations in the clinical practice to inform research activities and vice versa. Marrying these two diverse disciplines will enable healthcare systems to provide more efficient outcome-driven patient-centred interventions in the field of bladder cancer.

Our
Speakers

Chas

Bountra

UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD

Chas is Pro-Vice Chancellor for Innovation at the University of Oxford, Professor of Translational Medicine in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Medicine, CSO for the SGC, academic lead for the Dementia Drug Discovery Institute and Professorial Fellow at Keble College, Oxford. Prior to coming back to Oxford in 2008, Chas was Vice President and Head of Biology at GlaxoSmithKline. Chas is an invited expert on several government and charitable research funding bodies, and an advisor for many academic, biotech and pharma drug discovery programmes. In 2012 he was voted one of the “top innovators in the industry”, in 2014 received the “Rita and John Cornforth Award” from the Royal Society of Chemistry, in 2017 and 2018 was voted “Master of the Bench” from the Medicine Maker Power List, and in 2018 was awarded the “Order of the British Empire” in the New Years Honours List.

Rik

Bryan

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UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM

Rik Bryan is a former clinical urologist, and now a full-time bladder cancer research academic. He is the Chief Investigator of the Bladder Cancer Prognosis Programme (BCPP), the SELENIB clinical trial, and POUT-T. He leads the Bladder Cancer Group in the Institute of Cancer & Genomic Sciences. The group has a particular interest in the genomics and epigenomics of bladder cancer and related biomarkers, and novel agents, technologies and pathways.

Simon

Crabb

UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON

Dr Simon Crabb is an Associate Professor in Medical Oncology at the University of Southampton with a clinical practice specialising in genitourinary cancers at University Hospital Southampton. His research interests are focussed on the development of novel therapeutic strategies for bladder and prostate cancers. Dr Crabb is the Associate Clinical Director of the Southampton Clinical Trials Unit, Deputy Director of the Southampton Experimental Cancer Medicine Centre and a lead for early phase clinical trials in Southampton. He is chair of the Genomics England Clinical Interpretation Partnership for bladder cancer, and a member of the NCRI Bladder and Renal Group, the NCRI Prostate Group and the Experimental Medicine Expert Review Panel for Cancer Research UK. Dr Crabb is an active contributor to the UK academic trials portfolio in urological malignancies, including as Chief Investigator on the SPIRE, GUSTO and ProCAID trials, and lead for the rucaparib arm of the ATLANTIS trial.

Deborah

Enting

GUY'S & ST THOMAS NHS FOUNDATION TRUST/KING'S COLLEGE LONDON 

Deborah Enting is a Consultant Medical Oncologist at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust and specialises in urological malignancies and has a particular interest in bladder cancer. She completed her undergraduate training at The University of Groningen in The Netherlands before moving to the UK for specialist training in Oncology at Guy’s Hospital. As an academic trainee she completed a PhD with Prof Adrian Hayday at King’s College London in tumour immune surveillance. She is a principle investigator on various bladder cancer clinical trials and has been instrumental in the set up of the King’s Health Partners Bladder Cancer Biobank. Her academic interest focuses on lymphoid stress-surveillance by gamma delta T cell and NK cells in the context of bladder cancer. Deborah will give an overview of progress and ongoing research in the field on bladder cancer immunobiology.

Molly

Ingersoll

INSTITUT PASTEUR

Dr. Molly Ingersoll received her PhD in host-pathogen interactions from NYU School of Medicine working with Arturo Zychlinsky at NYU and at the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology in Berlin, Germany. After a brief postdoctoral fellowship at Washington University School of Medicine, in St Louis, MO with Scott Hultgren, studying innate immunity to urinary tract infection, Dr Ingersoll was a postdoctoral fellow at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City, investigating monocyte and dendritic cell biology. Currently, Dr. Ingersoll is a Group Leader at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, France studying immunity in the bladder in the context of infection and cancer.

Rob

Jones

UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW

Rob Jones is Professor of Clinical Cancer Research at the University of Glasgow and a Consultant at the Beatson West of Scotland Cancer Centre. His background includes a molecular biology PhD at the CRUK Beatson Institute and time spent working in Pharmaceutical Research and Development. His clinical practice is the medical management of cancers of the prostate, bladder and kidney. His research commitments include the management of a large portfolio of phase I, II and III trials as well as collaborative translational research with scientists from the Beatson Institute and elsewhere. He is the Chief Investigator of the PLUTO and ATLANTIS trials in urothelial cancer and the SAPROCAN and MAdCaP trials in prostate. He is director of the CR-UK Clinical Trials Unit in Glasgow, and head of the Cancer Clinical Trials Unit for Scotland collaboration (CaCTUS). He is Vice Chair of the UK NCRI Bladder and Kidney Cancer Group, and recently demitted the chairs of the advanced disease subgroup of the Prostate Group.

Anne

Kiltie

UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD

Anne Kiltie is Professor of Experimental Clinical Oncology and a CRUK Senior Clinical Group Leader at the Oxford Institute for Radiation Oncology.  She is also an Honorary Consultant Clinical Oncologist at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust.

Between 2001 and 2009 she was a Senior Lecturer / Honorary Consultant Clinical Oncologist at Leeds Institute of Molecular Medicine and St James' University Hospital, Leeds.  She was previously a Clinical Research Fellow at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund (ICRF) Clare Hall Laboratories in Hertfordshire. Her clinical training was undertaken at the Christie Hospital, Manchester, and Cookridge Hospital, Leeds. She studied Medicine at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, and Clinical Medicine at Balliol College, Oxford.

Anne is Chief Examiner for the MSc in Radiation BIology the Department of Oncology, University of Oxford.

Mark

Linch

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON

Dr Mark Linch is an Associate Professor at University College London (UCL) Cancer Insititute, where he leads the Urological Cancer Biology Group, and Honorary Consultant Medical Oncologist. Dr Linch trained in medical oncology at the Royal Marsden Hospital (RMH), London. In 2012 he was awarded a PhD in Cancer Cell Biology from UCL and the Cancer Research UK London Research Institute (LRI), now known as the Francis Crick Institute. He continued his post-doctoral studies at the LRI while also working as a Consultant Medical Oncologist at RMH. In 2014 Dr Linch moved to UCL to specialise in the clinical management and translational biology of prostate and bladder cancer. His research programme is funded by the NIHR/BRC, CRUK, Rosetrees Trust, Prostate Cancer Foundation and is focused on understanding the heterogeneity of cancer cell signalling and how this may impact on the immune response.

Steven

MacLennan

UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN

Steven is a Research Fellow in the Academic Urology Unit at the University of Aberdeen. His background is in social research methodology and current research interests cover the broad spectrum of evidence-based medicine in urology. This encompasses assessing the effectiveness of treatments in clinical trials, developing core outcome sets, providing critical reviews of the evidence base, creating clinical practice guidelines, and implementing guideline recommendations in clinical practice.

Prashant

Patel

UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM

Prashant Patel qualified in 1993 and took up a joint appointment as a Senior Lecturer in Urology at the University of Birmingham and Consultant Urological Surgeon at QE Hospital (UHB), Birmingham (2010) to pursue a career in academic and clinical urology. His academic interests are to explore molecular markers in bladder cancer, immunotherapeutic approaches in urological cancers and informatics. His clinical interests are in pelvic cancers (bladder and prostate) and retro-peritoneal node surgery for metastatic testicular cancer, developing a program in Robotic surgery at UHB and conduct clinical trials in urological cancers. He is also the deputy lead for Genomics and Tumour Advisory Board and Service lead for Urology at UHB.

Henry
Scowcroft

NCRI CONSUMER FORUM

Henry Scowcroft, Senior communications manager at Cancer Research UK, and consumer member on the NCRI Bladder & Renal Group

Henry spent four years at university studying biochemistry before realising that the laboratory life wasn’t for him, and going to work for a science journal instead. From there, he went on to complete a Masters in Science Communication and, after a brief flirtation with science journalism, in 2003 he joined Cancer Research UK's communications team. Since then, he has had a number of diverse roles at the charity, notably setting up, editing and writing for their digital news platform. In 2016, his fiancée was diagnosed with advanced bladder cancer and died shortly afterwards - an experience about which Henry is now writing a book, and which led to him taking on a number of advocacy and involvement roles.

Metin
Sitti

MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE, STUTTGART

Metin Sitti received the BSc and MSc degrees in electrical and electronics engineering from Boğaziçi University, Istanbul, Turkey, in 1992 and 1994, respectively, and the PhD degree in electrical engineering from the University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan, in 1999. He was a research scientist at University of California at Berkeley, USA during 1999-2002 and a professor in Department of Mechanical Engineering and Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, USA during 2002-2016. Since 2014, he has been the director of the Physical Intelligence Department at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems in Stuttgart, Germany. His research interests include small-scale physical intelligence, mobile milli/microrobots, bio-inspiration, advanced soft functional materials, and untethered soft medical devices. He is an IEEE Fellow. He received the ERC Advanced Grant in 2019, Rahmi Koç Science Prize in 2018, SPIE Nanoengineering Pioneer Award in 2011, and NSF CAREER Award in 2005. He received many best paper and video awards in major robotics conferences, e.g., Best Paper Award in the Robotics Science & Systems Conference in 2019. 

Mieke

Van Hemelrijck

KING'S COLLEGE LONDON 

Mieke Van Hemelrijck leads the Translational Oncology and Urology Research (TOUR) Team in the School of Cancer & Pharmaceutical Sciences at King's. She became a Reader (Associate Professor) in Cancer Epidemiology in September 2015. She joined the Group in August 2008 from Harvard School of Public Health to study for her PhD on 'Metabolic Syndrome and Prostate Cancer: Biomarkers and Treatment Side-effects', which she completed in November 2010. At Harvard, her Master's thesis focused on bladder cancer and smoking patterns, building on her Master's in Statistical Data-Analysis received from Ghent University in her home country of Belgium in 2006.

Mieke has an interest in clinical epidemiology of urological cancers. Since 2012, she has coordinated the King’s Health Partners' Uro-Oncology Programme, which brings together all researchers and clinicians involved in urological cancer research at KHP. In 2013, she became a Visiting Researcher at the Institute of Environmental Medicine, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, funded by a Swedish Council for Working Life and Social Research Fellowship.

Moreover, she was recently awarded a donation of £500,000 to establish a bladder cancer biobank at King’s Health Partners with the aim of advancing knowledge and research in this field. Bladder cancer is a unique, challenging disease. Through a collaboration with the Bladder Cancer Prognosis Programme at the University of Birmingham, she aims to run the new Bladder Cancer Biobank at King’s Health Partners resulting in high-impact translational research. 

Sponsors

The

Venue

ABOUT THIS VENUE:

Edgbaston Park Hotel and Conference Centre is part of the University of Birmingham Group. The University of Birmingham, one of the world’s top 100 institutions, has always been a pioneer: founded in 1900, it was the UK’s first civic university, welcoming students regardless of their social or religious background. Today, it continues to make important things happen. It’s a vibrant community which thrives on being innovative, original and ambitious – values we’re proud to share here at the hotel.

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As befits the diverse international community of Edgbaston, the hotel provides visitors with an inspiring place to meet and stay, in a quiet spot on the edge of campus.

FULL ADDRESS:

Edgbaston Park Hotel and Conference Centre
53 Edgbaston Park Road
Birmingham
B15 2RS