About the Bladder Cancer Research Centre
Over 10,000 patients are diagnosed with bladder cancer each year in the UK. Our multidisciplinary research team are improving the lives of bladder cancer patients by reducing the need for invasive exploratory tests, reducing the time taken for diagnosis and for receiving the correct treatment, as well as developing new drugs and new surgical approaches.
For decades bladder cancer research has attracted a disproportionately small amount of research funding when compared with other cancers, and so bladder cancer patients have not experienced some of the ‘breakthroughs’ witnessed in other cancers. Our ethos is to work collaboratively across multiple scientific and academic disciplines to overcome some of these barriers in order to translate biomedical science into healthcare benefits for bladder cancer patients.
Specifically, The Bladder Cancer Research Centre (BCRC) is a strategic multidisciplinary grouping within the Department of Cancer and Genomic Sciences at the University of Birmingham. Under the directorship of Mr Richard T Bryan, the BCRC undertakes translational research into urothelial cancer, with the core themes of:
- Biomarkers and proteomics (led by Dr Douglas Ward)
- Genomics and bioinformatics (led by Dr Roland Arnold)
- Novel therapeutics (led by Dr Farhat Khanim)
- Bio-medical engineering (led by Professor Duncan Shepherd)
- Clinical research and clinical trials (led by Mr Keval Patel).
We intend for our research to directly impact bladder cancer patients and patient pathways by, for example, reducing the need for diagnostic and surveillance cystoscopy (biomarkers and genomics), by ensuring that the right patients receive the right treatments at the right time (biomarkers and proteomics, genomics and bioinformatics), by developing new drugs and new surgical approaches (novel therapeutics and bio-medical engineering), and by making changes to clinical processes to reduce the time taken for diagnosis and for receiving the correct treatment (clinical research and clinical trials).
Our previous research and innovations for bladder cancer patients exemplify these intentions, and include:
Non-invasive diagnosis of bladder cancer (diagnostic urine test)
Non-invasive diagnosis of bladder cancer (diagnostic urine test)
Identifying aggressive ‘basal’ subtypes of bladder cancer with similarities to some cancer
Identifying aggressive ‘basal’ subtypes of bladder cancer with similarities to some cancer
Developing multiparmateric MRI as an alternative to transurethral resection for patients
Developing multiparmateric MRI as an alternative to transurethral resection for patients
Establishing the role of narrow band imaging cystoscopy in bladder cancer diagnosis
Establishing the role of narrow band imaging cystoscopy in bladder cancer diagnosis
- Narrow‐band imaging flexible cystoscopy in the detection of recurrent urothelial cancer of the bladder
- The Clinical Research Office of the Endourological Society (CROES) Multicentre Randomised Trial of Narrow Band Imaging–Assisted Transurethral Resection of Bladder Tumour (TURBT) Versus Conventional White Light Imaging–Assisted TURBT in Primary Non–Muscle-invasive Bladder Cancer Patients: Trial Protocol and 1-year Results
- European Association of Urology Non-muscle-invasive Bladder Cancer Guidelines
Investigating the importance of treatment delays and the centralisation of services
Investigating the importance of treatment delays and the centralisation of services
- Delay and survival in bladder cancer
- A Comparative Analysis of the Influence of Gender, Pathway Delays, and Risk Factor Exposures on the Long-term Outcomes of Bladder Cancer
- A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Delay in Radical Cystectomy and the Effect on Survival in Bladder Cancer Patients
- Centralisation of radical cystectomies for bladder cancer in England, a decade on from the ‘Improving Outcomes Guidance’: the case for super centralisation