Yohanka Perera: NZ patient-derived organoids: potential ‘avatars’ to guide personalized cancer therapy

<p dir="ltr">Breast cancer is the most common cancer among women in Aotearoa New Zealand, with ~3500 diagnoses and 700 deaths annually. Patient-derived organoids (PDOs) replicate tumour complexity and may help predict treatment response. This study established a cryopreserved bank of NZ-specific PDOs from treatment-naïve HER2+ and triple negative breast cancer (TNBC) tissues, achieving ~80% success (n=30). Organoids were histologically characterised and tested against clinically relevant therapies using viability assays and confocal microscopy, with responses compared to patient outcomes. Case studies from five patients (HER2+, HER2-low, and TNBC) demonstrated concordance between organoid and clinical drug responses. Notably, efficacy of the anti-HER2 therapy Trastuzumab Deruxtecan was confirmed in an NZ HER2+ model. Findings support PDOs as a predictive platform for guiding personalised breast cancer treatment and highlight the need for larger validation studies.</p>