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The Kids’ Cancer Project is proud to be involved in facilitating the TarGet trial, an innovative brain cancer study that will accelerate access to targeted treatments for high-grade childhood brain cancer.
The world-leading international clinical trial, set to open in 2026, is an innovative umbrella trial that tests multiple targeted treatments for a single disease. It will explore a range of treatments across different childhood brain cancers, with a key goal of ensuring the trial is accessible to children regardless of their specific tumour type.
The study will recruit patients across multiple hospital sites in both Australia and New Zealand, expanding access to cutting-edge research for families across the region.
TarGeT uses a precision medicine approach, with treatments targeted to specific tumour groups based on shared genetic features. The adaptive nature of the trial allows researchers to respond in real time to what is, and isn’t, working. If certain treatments are shown to be ineffective, they can be discontinued and replaced with new treatment options. Likewise, treatments that show promising results can be expanded and built upon.
The Kids’ Cancer Project CEO, Owen Finegan, says the trial forms part of The Kids’ Cancer Project’s mandate to deliver more effective, less harmful treatments for kids with cancer.
“We are hopeful that the trial will assist greatly in providing insights on new and innovative treatments for children and families facing horrific brain cancer diagnoses.”“The TarGet trial speaks to the ingenuity of researchers throughout Australia and New Zealand that have progressed their research from the lab to a world-first clinical trial,” Finegan says.
In collaboration with ANZCHOG (Australian and New Zealand Children’s Haematology Oncology Group), the TarGeT Collaborative (Robert Connor Dawes Foundation, Children's Cancer Foundation, My Room Children’s Cancer Charity, The Kids’ Cancer Project, Mark Hughes Foundation, and Cure Starts Now (Australia and US) have come together to fund and support the seven-year recruitment phase of this important study.
With one arm of the trial already open in the United States, the team is now preparing to open the trial to patients in Australia and New Zealand in the new year.
Professor Nick Gottardo, Principal Investigator of the TarGeT trial in Australia and New Zealand, says the trial represents a critical step forward for children facing devastating diagnoses.
“High grade glioma in children remains a formidable challenge,” Professor Gottardo says.
“We urgently need trials like this so we can move quickly to understand which therapies might work for these very hard-to-treat cancers.”
