Phuoc Thien Huynh
University of Sydney
Rotary International District 9640
Bowel Cancer 2011
Phuoc completed her Bachelor of Medical Science degree with first class honours at University of Sydney in 2010. Her honours project involved investigating the roles of macrophages on the development of colorectal cancer and determining predictive factors of survival outcomes in colorectal cancer patients which could serve as targets for pharmacological interventions. She wishes to pursue a career in cancer research and hopes to one day find a novel treatment or cure for cancer patients.
From July 2010 to March 2011, she has worked as a research assistant at the Cancer Pharmacology Unit at Concord Hospital, NSW. During this time she has assisted in various aspects of the colorectal cancer and cachexia project; which involved tissue culture, maintaining the cachexia mouse model and molecular analysis of various organs involved in metabolic processes.
She is currently a PhD candidate at University of Sydney, Department of Pharmacology. Her PhD project aims to investigate inflammatory biomarkers in colorectal cancer patients to correlate them to clinical outcomes. This may lead to personalising chemotherapy for colorectal cancer patients to ensure that they receive the optimal therapeutic benefits and reduce the unwanted side effects associated with chemotherapy.
SUMMARY OF PROJECT:
Inflammatory determinants for colorectal cancer treatment
In Australia, colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the most common cancers and a leading cause of cancer-related deaths. Whilst chemotherapy regimens have significantly improved the median survival of patients with advanced CRC, these treatments have come at a cost of increased expenditure, increased toxicities and lack of response to treatment in many patients. Therefore there is need to improve ways of identifying patients who are at a greater risk of toxicity or lack the therapeutic benefits; to reduce the cost and minimise the unnecessary toxicity due to these treatment.
Our group has recently demonstrated that inflammatory proteins can serve as a predictive marker for clinical outcomes of chemotherapy. They have developed innovative proteomics techniques to study the inflammatory response that will form the basis of this study. This project aims to further determine inflammatory biomarkers to correlate with clinical outcomes and toxicity in CRC patients in response to chemotherapy. These proteins will assist in personalising chemotherapy for CRC patients to ensure that they are optimally treated.