Leiomyosarcoma Repository Tissue Bank
Needs your samples for research
Have you ever had surgery? . . . or planning to soon?
Donating your tissue samples is
easy!
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Step One
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Step Two
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Step Three
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FAX OR MAIL
both forms to
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LMS Sarcoma Repository Tissue Bank
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c/o Dr. John S. J. Brooks, Chair of Pathology
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Pennsylvania Hospital, 800 Spruce St., Phila. PA 19107
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Fax
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215-829-7564
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Phone
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215-829-3541 (Ms. Diane Flynn)
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That's it!
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The advantage of having a tissue bank is that researchers can go to one place & access enough tissue to conduct research. With only 4 patients in 1 million, LMS tissue samples are scarce and scattered in every hospital across the globe. Often, hospitals hoard and refuse to share these precious samples. Researchers have no way to know who or where these LMS patients are.
Bottom line, without a tissue bank, it is impossible for researchers to get enough samples to conduct any valuable research on LMS. No samples, no research, no cure!
In 2004-2005, the LMS patient community collected over 300 of their own tissue samples and donated them to Dr. Matt van de Rijn at Stanford University. Using state-of-art bio technology, Dr. van de Rijn conducted an extensive DNA & tissue microarray analysis. This study is by far the most extensive and promising research ever done on LMS. We are all anxiously awaiting the pending results of this work.
After these 300 samples are no longer needed for the microarray study, the LMS tissue bank is their ideal home. Dr. Brooks, at U of Penn Hospital, set up this bank to enable more researchers to take advantage of these samples for further study.
Dr. Matt van de Rijn, highly supports this opportunity, and encourages those who sent samples to him, to complete the same 3 steps above to have their samples turned over the LMS tissue bank with Dr. Brooks.
We are depending on the spirit of the LMS community to continue to donate tissue for research. We need as many samples as possible, there are no limits. Together, we can build our LMS tissue bank’s collection.
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A letter from Dr. John Brooks,
Founder & Director of the
LMS Sarcoma Repository Tissue Bank
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Participate in New
LMS Repository Tissue Bank
Dr. John Brooks, a pathologist in Philadelphia, has been awarded a grant from the LMS Foundation to set up a LMS Repository Tissue Bank, to house tumor tissue blocks from LMS patients.
He is now asking if you would like to participate in this collection process, which will provide the needed infrastructure for future research. Basically, the Bank serves as a resource of material for investigators. No research can be accomplished easily without such a resource. Research projects on the blocks will be approved by a Scientific Advisory Committee, according to NIH guidelines.
Some of you have participated in the LMS Microarray Study by Dr. Matt Van de Rijn at Stanford and had your blocks donated there. Dr. Brooks will need to have a consent form signed by you to hopefully allow your blocks to be sent to him by Dr Van de Rijn (rather than be sent back to the original hospital). Thus, if you were involved, please look at the U of Penn Consent form, print it out, and fill it out; be sure to check yes in two places - yes to participate in the study, and yes in the spot asking for your material to be sent to Dr Brooks from Dr Van de Rijn. When completed, please either fax the last page of the form to Dr Brooks (fax number is on it) or send/mail to the address on the Consent Form itself.
Others who may not have participated in the LMS Microarray Study may hopefully be willing to do so now. All work of contacting the original hospital will be done by Dr. Brooks, once he has the information, so be sure to fill out the hospital's address. We are trying to collect as many LMS tumor blocks as possible.
If you agree to participate, you can also fill out the last page of the informed consent forms, being sure to include the Hospital where the tumor was removed (as opposed to a small biopsy); this would be valuable information even if your block was sent to Dr Van de Rijn, as the hospital needs to be told your block is being forwarded to the bank. If you would like, you could be sent an informed consent document by mail, for you to sign. No one can participate without a signed consent form, as required by the IRB (Institutional Review Board).
Your information will be kept confidentially, including in the future when your tissue block is sent to a researcher, who will only know tumor characteristics like location, size, etc..
If you need a paper copy of the Consent, please call 215-829-3541 and identify yourself as an LMS patient or family member and my secretary Diane Flynn will assist you.
Thank you for considering participation in the new LMS Sarcoma Repository Tissue Bank.
John S. J. Brooks, M.D.,
Pathology Department,
Pennsylvania Hospital
February 2006
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Last Edited -
13 December 2006 19:17 pm
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