Expanding our footprint in advancing precision medicine for children with malignant brain tumors, we are funding Dr. Samuel H. Cheshier, MD, PhD, to lead an innovative precision medicine program at Intermountain Primary Children’s Hospital that tailors treatment to each child’s unique brain tumor.
Over the past four years, this approach has already been applied successfully to children at Intermountain Primary Children’s Hospital. Now, the program is advancing toward a prospective clinical trial that will offer precision analysis to every child undergoing surgery for a malignant brain tumor at the hospital.
Using a powerful functional multi-omics platform, tumor samples collected at surgery are rapidly analyzed—combining molecular sequencing, real-time drug testing, and expert review—to identify the therapies most likely to work for each individual child. The goal is to deliver clinically actionable results within just 10 days, when treatment decisions matter most.
The program also introduces major innovations, including:
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High-throughput, robotics-based drug screening
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Testing therapies directly on patient tumor cells in biologically realistic brain models
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A broadened evaluation of treatments, including chemotherapy, radiation, immune therapies, and targeted drugs
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The integration of artificial intelligence and machine learning to enhance therapy selection alongside expert clinical judgment
This work has the potential to expand beyond a single institution—with plans for expansion at Chapel Hill, North Carolina—creating a model for how precision medicine can transform care for children with brain tumors nationwide.
