EORTC and Alliance Healthcare’s continued partnership in support of SPECTA clinical research infrastructure

EORTC and Alliance Healthcare’s continued partnership in support of SPECTA clinical research infrastructure

Brussels, May 19, 2022 – The European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) is happy to announce its continued partnership with Alliance Healthcare, one of the largest pharmaceutical wholesalers in Europe. Specifically, the collaboration supports the organisation’s SPECTA platform, a pan-European translational research infrastructure for all tumour types including rare cancers.

The EORTC SPECTA platform allows for the rapid implementation of new clinical trials and robust translational cancer research aimed at increasing our understanding of cancers in order to guide a more targeted clinical research and treat patients effectively.

Alliance Healthcare was previously owned by Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA) until June 2021. Since then, Alliance Healthcare is a wholly owned subsidiary of AmerisourceBergen and the EORTC is delighted that its support and commitment to SPECTA is to continue under this new ownership. The fantastic support that Alliance Healthcare as part of WBA has provided over the past 10 years (since 2011) will persist to further reinforce and strengthen recognition of the SPECTA platform as the leading pan-European translational research infrastructure. The partnership with Alliance Healthcare under the umbrella of AmerisourceBergen will ensure the continuation of SPECTA’s work in personalised cancer medicine, helping guide patients’ treatments, but also advance our understanding of cancer biology to help treat more patients effectively.

Through the growth of SPECTA's translational clinical research, it provides hope to thousands of patients. One patient with papillary thyroid cancer said that their "current treatment was defined after [their] inclusion in SPECTA" and after previous treatments didn't work.

Treating oncologists also benefit from SPECTA. Pr. Jean-Yves Blay has said “the SPECTA study enables [the opportunity] to gain more understanding on the nature of the disease and to guide the treatment of many patients with rare cancer, which is quite unique.”

Today, SPECTA's ever-growing cancer clinical research platform includes 128 authorized research doctors in 17 countries. More than 1330 patients have participated in 3 clinical research projects with over 1200 individual result reports provided to patients and providing guidance for their treatment.

EORTC CEO, Dr Denis Lacombe commented "EORTC looks forward to continue working with Alliance Healthcare and AmerisourceBergen, pushing the boundaries of understanding cancer and furthering the standard of care for cancer patients in the European continent, through SPECTA."

Juan Guerra, SVP Managing Director at Alliance Healthcare said “I am extremely proud of the efforts of Alliance Healthcare colleagues Europe-wide over the last decade. The work the EORTC does, and advancements in cancer therapies and treatment SPECTA brings about, is critical in the fight against this disease. I am extremely happy that under our new AmerisourceBergen ownership we are continuing to help and support through a range of fundraising initiatives and a donation from the AmerisourceBergen Foundation as together we aim to improve the health and wellbeing of patient populations.”