Fight against cancer, Onconaut platform to find targeted therapies and new studies

A compass platform that can help the user find, based on the type of tumor and related biological markers, personalized therapies, new guidelines but also the latest clinical trials. It is ‘Onconaut-Navigating Personalized Cancer Therapies‘, a simple web page that allows you to explore what Medicine and Oncology can offer with respect to a specific neoplasm. The Onconaut platform was developed by the Bioinformatics and Omics Data Science Platform of the Berlin Institute for Medical Systems Biology-Max Delbruck Center.

“A doctor or a patient can use Onconaut by entering specific information about cancer biomarkers or patient case (such as tumor stage, type, diagnosis) into the search function. For example – Altuna Akalin, bioinformatician and director of the Omics Data Science Platform at the Berlin Institute for Medical Systems Biology, explains to Adnkronos Salute -if a patient has been diagnosed with lung cancer and their tumor carries a Kras mutation, the doctor or patient can type in ‘Kras and lung cancer’ and Onconaut will provide the latest clinical treatment guidelines, a list of available drugs for tumors with Kras mutations, treatment risks, and outcome statistics. It will also list relevant clinical trials, helping the patient and doctor make informed decisions about treatment options.”

What are the most frequent searches on Onconaut? “Those related to cancer biomarkers and specific types of tumors – replies Akalin – For example the Kras mutation for lung cancer or Brca1 for breast cancer”. Onconaut is an open and free platform, who can help? “It is definitely a tool for oncologists and patients,” Akalin emphasizes, “it provides them with personalized treatment options based on the latest medical research and clinical guidelines.”

But not only according to Akalin, “it can also help patients who are looking for a second opinion on their medical diagnoses or who are looking for potential diagnoses based on their symptoms and medical test results. The tool – he concludes – aims to speed up the decision-making processmaking experts more productive and giving novices a head start in understanding complex medical information.”