A prognostic test based on immunohistochemistry technique already available in general hospital setting. The kit allows the identification of Nuclear Factor Kappa B (NF-kB) in the nucleus of epithelial cells in PR or in prostate biopsy samples.

The NF-kB biomarker is a prognosis test suitable for prostate tissue specimens or biopsy samples analysis.

Prognosis: Following positive diagnostic, the test allow the identification of those patients with the most aggressive forms of prostate cancer in order to propose a more aggressive therapy, or avoid unnecessary treatment;

Disease monitoring: the test could be used to monitor disease progression in response to the chosen therapy;

The technology has been tested in two separate trials confirming a strong correlation between the formation of metastases and changes in nucleic NF-kB levels in prostate tissue.

The NF-kB prognostic test shall be part of a combination of other biomarkers and pathological data to improve prognosis specificity and sensitivity.

Prostate cancer is the most frequently diagnosed cancer and the third leading cause of death by cancer in North American men. Actually, 2 millions Americans are leaving with prostate cancer. Every year, 232 000 men will be diagnosed, 70 000 patients will require treatments following cancer relapse and 30 000 patients will die. Although most prostate cancers are diagnosed at an early stage of the disease, it is difficult to predict whether a clinically localized prostate cancer will remain latent or progress into an aggressive highly metastatic disease. Following radical prostatectomy (RP), it is still controversial whether immediate adjuvant treatment should be initiated in the presence of pathologically confirmed positive surgical margins. Several factors such as time to biochemical recurrence, net PSA level and positive margins after RP, PSA doubling time, and Gleason score have been identified as predictors of progression to metastasis disease. However, reliability on a large cohort and clinical utility has to be demonstrated since those markers often provide a moderately differentiated prognosis. Therefore, the identification of a reliable prognostic marker of biochemical recurrence will allow developing a risk-adjusted therapeutic approach.

- First confirmed and reliable biomarker of prostate cancer prognosis;

- Validation on 3 000 tissue micro-array samples;

- Test suitable for tissue or biopsy samples;

- Further on-going validation studies with important financial support from provincial government;

The technology is available for licensing and R&D partnership.