The funding is to allow for the extension of a Phase One Clinical Trial currently taking place. This is a therapeutic Phase 1 study with a standard “3+3” design intended to assess the safety of the convection enhanced delivery (CED) of a radio-antibody in the treatment of children with DIPG.
Diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG) in childhood is currently a consistently lethal condition. Ineffective drug delivery has been postulated asa dominant reason for poor tumour response in children with DIPG.
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One means for overcoming this limitation is to use convection enhanced delivery(CED), a form of local drug delivery that bypasses the blood brain barrier(BBB). Using this strategy in the brain stem has until recently been only theoretical and experimental.
Based on preliminary success, the funding is for an extension of a phase one clinical trial defining the tolerated infusion dose (MTiD) and/or an infusion volume (T2-weighted images) that best approximates the intended treatment (tumour)volume.

This is the second grant awarded to Dr Souweidane. The first one in the amount of $114,670 was awarded in September2012 for “Assessing Regional Tumour Response After Convection Enhanced Delivery(CED) for Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma”.

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