LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A new lab in Louisville is working to identify cancers and how to treat them faster than ever before.
The Norton Cancer Institute Genomics Lab in St. Matthews is home to our area's first on-site genomic testing, known as next generation sequencing (NGS).
Instead of your doctor sending cancer biopsies to out of town laboratories and waiting weeks for results, pathologists are getting the results in real time within days - right here at home.
They can quickly determine what drives a tumor's growth and tailor advanced treatments to kill it.
"The sequencing is what produces the results that tell us whether there's a genetic abnormality that could be targeted by a specific treatment, or would allow the patient to enroll in a clinical trial that's available to them," Jessica Barry, manager of the molecular lab, said.
"The quicker we get the right answer, the better we're going to be and having it right here in our community is vital. In my career, it's a culmination of something that was a dream not too many years ago," Dr. Joseph Flynn, Physician in Chief of Norton Cancer Institute, said.
The Norton Cancer Institute Genomics Lab was made possible by a $250,000 donation from the Steven Vanover Foundation, in memory of Steven who died at just 24 from a rare and aggressive form of sarcoma. It's testing and treatments like the ones coming out of this lab that could have made a huge difference in his life.
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