Cholangiocarcinoma, is a rare form of liver cancer, with an increasing global incidence rate. These tumors remain poorly understood and largely incurable. Drawing on the immense health data collection of the APHP (Public Hospitals of Paris) and Guerbet's expertise in liver imaging, the CHOTHERIA project aims to revolutionize the radiological characterization of cholangiocarcinoma in order to build a tool to support therapeutic decision-making and personalize patient management.
Cholangiocarcinomas are a heterogeneous group of cancerous diseases. This affliction is relatively rare, accounting for about 3% of digestive tumors and about 15% of primary liver tumors. The incidence of cholangiocarcinoma varies greatly from one continent to another, approaching 100 per 100,000 in some parts of Asia and being less than 1 per 100,000 in North America. However, its incidence has been increasing worldwide over the last decades. The tumor development of cholangiocarcinoma usually remains silent until an advanced stage, and its prognosis is poor with a 5-year survival rate between 7 and 20%. Surgical resection, the only curative option, can only be performed in one-third of diagnosed patients, as advanced-stage cholangiocarcinoma is inoperable(1).
As part of the “AI for Health 2020” challenge, Guerbet developed a prototype of a therapeutic decision-making support tool dedicated to intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma, with an emphasis on surgical resection. The preliminary work demonstrated the technical feasibility of predicting biomarkers associated with the prognosis after surgical resection from preoperatively injected abdominal-pelvic CT imaging – partially lifting the veil on the potential of routine imaging for therapeutic decision-making in cholangiocarcinoma. The key objective, at the heart of the CHOTHERIA project, is to develop a method capable of predicting the molecular profile of cholangiocarcinoma from standard preoperative imaging data built from this prototype. If we are successful in developing the method, it will open the path for building a powerful software solution, with the potential to guide clinicians’ decision-making in selecting the most appropriate, personalized therapy for each patient and thus improve the outcome for patients with cholangiocarcinoma.
Références.
- Banales JM, Marin JJG, Lamarca A, et al. Cholangiocarcinoma 2020: the next horizon in mechanisms and management. Nat. Rev. Gastroenterol. Hepatol. Nature Research; 2020. p. 557–588. doi: 10.1038/s41575-020-0310-z.
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