Patient recruitment for the Australian Ovarian Cancer Study ceased on 30 June 2006. We will no longer be approaching patients to participate in the study, however, clinical data collection is ongoing. Access to medical records from consented participants will therefore continue through to 2010, thanks to a newly funded NHMRC project grant for collection of clinical follow-up data. This will take us close to our goal of 5-year minimum follow-up on all patients. Data analysis is currently underway and is also expected to continue over the next 5 years.

A total of 2456 women from all Australian states had consented to participate in the study of which 1859 are eligible cases. This number far exceeds our original target of 1000 cases over 3 years. Nationally, we have received a total of 1672 completed epidemiological/dietary questionnaires, 1608 blood samples and 1097 fresh tissue samples. Clinical Follow-Up has been initiated on 2358 patients, with a minimum of 5-year follow-up planned (to be completed in mid-2011). Of the eligible cases, 78% are cases of invasive cancer and 22% are low malignant potential (LMP).

Control recruitment is complete and we have recruited 1073 control women who do not have ovarian cancer and have received 1072 questionnaires and 924 blood samples, again exceeding our initial targets.

At 31 December 2006, Clinical Follow-Up forms had been received on 2358 patients nationally. This number includes patients that were recruited but subsequently found to have benign disease and were therefore not followed beyond Form 1.

The Post-Operative Data form has been completed on 99.6% of the total patient population recruited to date. The Primary Treatment Form, including chemotherapy details and response to treatment, has been completed on 90% of cases that have completed their primary treatment and 12, 18, 24, 30 and 36 month follow-up has been completed on 85, 79, 77, 74 and 69% of eligible cases respectively. Over 35% of AOCS cases have their ongoing treatment in a centre other than the hospital where they were initially recruited and we have implemented various strategies to ensure that cases are not ‘lost to follow-up’. Collection of clinical data from 153 centres in metropolitan, regional and rural areas across the country has meant that thus far only 31 AOCS patients (1.7%) have been lost to follow-up.

Recruitment Information by State and/or Hospital

State	Hospital	Cases Recruited
Queensland	Royal Women’s Hospital Mater Hospital Wesley Hospital	521
Victoria	Freemasons Hospital Mercy Hospital Monash Medical Centre	326
New South Wales	Royal Hospital for Women Royal North Shore / North Shore Private Westmead Royal Prince Alfred John Hunter	425
South Australia	Flinders Medical Centre Royal Adelaide Hospital	206
Tasmania	Royal Hobart Hospital	94
Western Australia	King Edward Memorial Hospital St John of God Hospitals	284
TOTAL		1858

Project 1 - Molecular Subtype Analysis of Ovarian Cancer

Under Construction

 

Project 2 - Determinants of Epithelial Ovarian Cancer - By Histologic Subtype & Tumour Behaviour

Under Construction

 

Project 3 - Low Risk Genes for Epithelial Ovarian Cancer

Although some high-risk ovarian cancer genes have been identified, it is likely that common low penetrance alleles exist that confer some increase in ovarian cancer risk.  We have examined nine genetic variants in genes involved in hormone synthesis and DNA repair in the cases and controls from the Australian Ovarian Cancer Study.  The only variant we found to be associated with ovarian cancer risk was one in the SRD5A2 gene which results in an altered amino acid. We then genotyped another variant in this gene, in an attempt to validate this finding in an independent set of cases and controls (from the UK, USA and Denmark). There was no association between the second variant and ovarian cancer risk in the validation samples, so further analyses of variants in this gene are warranted to determine whether SRD5A2 plays a role in ovarian cancer predisposition.

 

Clinical - Follow Up Core

Under Construction