Cambridge Cognition Holdings Plc (LON:COG), which develops and markets digital solutions to assess brain health, has announced that it has won a £1 million contract as the cognitive assessment partner for a late phase cancer trial. This is the second contract for a top ten pharmaceutical company with a strong pipeline of oncology products. The revenue from the contract is expected to be recognised over the next six years.
Oncology is the leading therapeutic area for drug development and accounted for nearly a third of clinical trials in 20201. This contract positions the Company in the world’s most consistently active disease space with a client that is committed to developing oncology therapeutics.
Cancer survival has doubled in the last 40 years in the UK2. With patients now living longer there is a greater focus on limiting potentially detrimental long-term side effects of both diagnosis and treatment. One key area is cognitive impairment, for which deficits have been reported in 90% of patients with brain tumours and an estimated 30% of patients following chemotherapy3.
Cognitive decline associated with cancer most notably affects attention, memory, and executive function. The pharmaceutical company has selected Cambridge Cognition as the cognitive assessment provider for its pivotal oncology trial as they believe that CANTABTM cognitive assessments have the sensitivity to measure these distinct processes. Consequently, CANTABTM will be used worldwide to determine preservation or improvement in cognitive function across all 150 trial sites.
Matthew Stork, Chief Executive Officer of Cambridge Cognition, said:
“Earlier detection and advances in treatment have to led to considerable improvements in cancer survival rates and, at the same time, increased attention on the cognitive side-effects. This pharmaceutical client has a long-standing commitment to improving outcomes for cancer patients and we are delighted to be supporting their efforts. We expect that this could become a considerable growth area for Cambridge Cognition in the future.”
References
1. GlobalData. 2020. Oncology dominates clinical trials activity in 2020. https://www.globaldata.com/oncology-dominates-clinical-trials-activity-in-2020-says-globaldata/
2. Cancer Research UK. Cancer survival for all cancers combined. https://www.cancerresearchuk.org/health-professional/cancer-statistics/survival#heading-Zero
3. Assessment and management of cognitive symptoms in patients with brain tumours, Parsons & Dietrich, American Society of Clinical Oncology Educational Book 41 (May 19, 2021) e90-e99.x`
