Daniel Spratt

About Daniel Spratt

Some prostate cancer patients who undergo radiation therapy do not derive a significant benefit from this treatment.

The androgen receptor (AR) is the primary factor mediating growth and survival in prostate cancer cells. Levels of AR can be enhanced by radiation therapy and thereby limit the effects of radiation therapy by promoting cancer cell survival.

Dr. Daniel Spratt will compare serum biomarkers and imaging technologies to create a non-invasive predictive tool that determines the activity of AR in patients undergoing radiation therapy. This tool will be tested in phase 0 clinical trials for validation and optimization.

If successful, this project will create a clinical tool to determine whether a patient undergoing radiation therapy may benefit from the addition of androgen deprivation therapy (ADT).

What this means for patients: The practice of personalized medicine requires the development of tools that enable optimal prescription of treatment regimens based on an individual’s unique tumor characteristics. This research will create a tool to non-invasively monitor tumor responses to radiation therapy and identify patients who will need more aggressive therapeutic interventions.