Oncode Institute is accelerating the path from discovery to patient impact. Through our Clinical Proof-of-Concept (CPoC) programme - designed to bridge fundamental research and clinical application - we support projects that turn strong scientific insights into concrete diagnostic or therapeutic innovations.
We’re now excited to announce that we awarded three ambitious projects that each tackle a major clinical bottleneck: improving access to skin-cancer surgery, a non invasive prenatal diagnostic test, and restoring therapy sensitivity in metastatic breast cancer. Together, they represent exactly what the programme was created for: transforming deep mechanistic understanding into real-world solutions for patients.
Henk Verheul, Chair of Oncode Institute’s Clinical Advisory Board, commented on the award:
“Translating fundamental research into clinical proof of concept studies is a crucial step in the journey from discovery to impact medical care. It’s where scientific innovations begin moving innovative diagnostics and therapeutics towards clinical implementation to improve patients' survival and quality of life."
AI Support Could Shorten Waiting Times and Expand Access to Mohs Surgery
Non-melanoma skin cancer is rising rapidly, but the number of trained Mohs surgeons is limited, leaving many patients on months-long waiting lists. Oncode Investigator Geert Litjens (Radboud UMC) and his team have developed an AI tool that can accurately identify basal cell carcinoma in frozen tissue during Mohs surgery - a task that has traditionally been challenging to automate. Trained on tissue from over 3,000 patients and validated across multiple international centers, the algorithm is ready for clinical testing.
“AI holds enormous potential for medicine, but the path from lab discovery to clinical use is often slowed by regulatory hurdles and high development costs. This new CPoC grant helps bridge that gap for skin cancer care by supporting a pivotal trial to test whether AI can ease the growing pressure on Mohs surgeons” says Litjens. “By accelerating translation into practice, we hope to help safeguard access to this essential, tissue-preserving surgery for future patients” he adds.
The project will validate accuracy on complex retrospective cases; test workflow efficiency and procedure times prospectively and explore expansion to other skin cancers, including squamous cell carcinoma.
If successful, this AI-assisted approach could make Mohs surgery faster, reduce costs, and broaden access, ultimately helping more patients get timely, tissue-sparing treatment. Unlike previous single-center tools, this algorithm is built on large, multi-center validation and is on a clear path toward clinical certification.
Toward an All-in-One Non-Invasive Prenatal Genetic Test
Each year, thousands of couples in the Netherlands at risk of passing on hereditary cancer face difficult choices. Current options - pre-implantation genetic testing or invasive prenatal diagnostics - are burdensome and emotionally stressful.
Oncode Investigator Wouter de Laat (UMC Utrecht) and his team aim to bring a fully non-invasive prenatal diagnostic (NIPD) blood test for families with hereditary cancer into clinical practice. “Prenatal diagnostics currently requires an invasive procedure with a small miscarriage risk and can only be done after 11–12 weeks of pragnancy,” says de Laat. “Families would benefit tremendously from a non-invasive test that only needs an maternal blood draw and can be offered earlier, around week 8–10. Our goal is to develop a safe, simple, and future-proof NIPD method suitable for all couples at risk.”
The method uses a two-step approach: first determining parental haplotypes, then genotyping the fetus via cell-free DNA from maternal blood. Early validation in a national, multi-center study shows this approach is accurate and robust.
Next steps include switching to long-read whole-genome sequencing for a single all-in-one test suitable for any gene, expanding clinical validation with 100 additional pregnancies, and integrating workflows and analysis pipelines with the national infrastructure.
Compared with existing methods, this approach is universal, early, and fully non-invasive, offering safer and more accessible prenatal genetic testing for families at risk.
Repurposing Corticosteroids to Boost Hormone Therapy in Metastatic Breast Cancer
Metastatic breast cancer remains incurable for many patients, and treatment options after endocrine therapy resistance are limited. Previous studies showed that very low-calorie diets could improve responses to hormone therapy, but such diets are difficult for patients, negatively impact quality of life and not without risk. Insights from the lab of Oncode Investigator Wilbert Zwart (Netherlands Cancer Institute) revealed why such diets improve hormonal response: fasting raises cortisol levels, activating the glucocorticoid receptor (GR) in tumor cells, which boosts hormone therapy effectiveness.
Building on this, preclinical work demonstrated that corticosteroids can safely mimic the effect of fasting, reactivating hormone-therapy sensitivity without extreme diets. The upcoming Phase II clinical trial will test whether adding corticosteroids to standard endocrine therapy improves outcomes for patients with ERα-positive metastatic breast cancer. The study leverages a patented GR-activity gene signature to help identify patients most likely to benefit.
“This study identifies a potentially simple, safe, and cost-effective strategy to prolong the effectiveness of hormone therapy in breast cancer” says Wilbert Zwart. “Without Oncode Institute, this study and its swift clinical translation simply would not have happened. Thanks to Oncode’s CPoC program, we could quickly turn our discovery into a clinical trial, aiming to improve therapeutic options for patients using inexpensive, well-established medications.”
If successful, widely available and inexpensive approach could delay disease progression, postpone or avoid the need for more intense treatments, and improve quality of life.
Geert Litjens
Wouter de Laat
