Dr. Aljitawi: Currently there is no standardized model that we can use in the lab to predict the response in humans. So what we do is we treat all patients the same way. So treat them the same with the same chemotherapy and then find out which ones respond, which ones don’t, and if they don’t we use a separate agent.
Each patient has really different type of leukemia, when you think about it. So having individualized treatment would be helpful and having a platform that allows you to test that will be helpful.
This Matrix provides a platform to test any patient samples and this model and so you take a patient’s sample, you take the cells, seed them on the Matrix and then you can culture those and then add different types of drugs are available in the market and see the effect of this chemotherapy on these cells in the lab.
By testing that, you can figure out which one is more effective use that particular drug in the patient.