By Joe Dangor

Mayo Clinic announced an agreement on Tuesday, Oct. 12 that will allow it to offer clinical-grade comprehensive cancer genomic sequencing to cancer patients who choose to participate. Test results will be available to patients and their treating health care providers to guide therapeutic decisions, advance cancer research, and support the development of new diagnostic tests and therapies for cancer treatment.

Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, Mayo Clinic's Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology, and Mayo Clinic's Center for Individualized Medicine are collaborating with Personalis Inc. (Nasdaq: PSNL), a cancer genomics company whose clinical-grade, comprehensive cancer genomic test includes sequencing the entire coding genome through whole-exome and transcriptome sequencing. The test will provide a clinical report for each patient and comprehensive aggregated data that Mayo Clinic and Personalis will use to further develop this comprehensive diagnostic approach.

"We believe the use of aggregated and de-identified genomic sequencing data will improve both patient care and patient access to care," says Konstantinos Lazaridis, M.D., medical director of Mayo Clinic's Center for Individualized Medicine. Dr. Lazaridis says the consortium will make it possible to offer individual patients a clinical benefit in their treatment and the ability to contribute data in the aggregate that may lead to the development of new and improved treatments and systems that will benefit all patients.

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Tags: cancer, cancer genomics, Dr. Konstantinos Lazaridis, Genetic Testing, genomic medicine, Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, Precision Medicine, predictive genomics, Research