Profound Medical (NASDAQ:PROF; TSX:PRN) and Telix Pharmaceuticals (ASX:TLX; NASDAQ:TLX) have entered into a co-education agreement which establishes a framework through which the companies intend to educate urologists, radiologists, nuclear medicine physicians and prostate cancer centers on the complementary roles of Telix’s advanced prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) targeting PET molecular imaging technologies, Gozellix and Illuccix, and Profound’s MRI-guided, AI-powered, robotically-driven and incisionless TULSA-PRO platform across the prostate care continuum.
Planned initiatives include participation in major scientific and medical society meetings, key opinion leader programs, educational summits, speaker programs and webinars, as well as the development of educational content, clinical case studies and best-practice materials. The collaboration is intended to increase physician awareness of PSMA-informed treatment pathways, support appropriate patient selection and treatment planning, and expand access to the TULSA Procedure.
“This agreement strengthens our relationship with an important strategic participant in the prostate cancer ecosystem and increases our access to urologists across the U.S. and internationally,” said Arun Menawat, PhD, Profound’s CEO and Chairman, in a statement. “By bringing together advanced molecular imaging and incisionless, MRI-guided therapy, we see an opportunity to support broader market development, enhance clinical education and increase awareness of the complementary value of our respective technologies. Over time, we also believe the incorporation of Telix’s PSMA-PET capabilities within TULSA-PRO centers could strengthen their clinical and economic value proposition, including by supporting more informed treatment decisions and potentially enhancing return on investment.”
Kevin Richardson, CEO, Telix Precision Medicine said in a statement, “As new technologies continue to transform prostate cancer care, clinical education is essential to helping physicians understand how PSMA-PET imaging can inform patient selection and treatment planning across a range of minimally invasive and image-guided approaches. Through this collaboration with Profound, we aim to increase awareness of the complementary roles of PSMA-PET imaging and MRI-guided therapy and support more personalized care for patients.”
Potential to Expand TULSA-PRO’s Addressable Market
Profound’s broader strategic objective is to explore opportunities that could expand the clinical utility and adoption of TULSA-PRO.
PSMA-PET imaging may help physicians determine whether certain patients with higher-risk disease remain appropriate candidates for the TULSA Procedure by identifying distant metastases or disease beyond the prostate that may not otherwise be readily detected. Profound believes this additional diagnostic information could enable more precise patient stratification and potentially broaden the population considered for the TULSA Procedure.
Profound is also developing PSMA-PET–MR image-fusion capabilities for inclusion in a planned future release of its Treatment Delivery Console, or TDC, software. The planned functionality is intended to allow Telix’s diagnostic PSMA-PET data to be incorporated into TULSA-PRO treatment planning, using real-time intra-operative MR images, which are much more precise than competitor approaches that rely on registering old diagnostic data to real-time ultrasound.
Profound believes that the combination of MRI and PSMA-PET imaging will be an important new differentiator for TULSA-PRO. It will not only provide clinicians with the enhanced ability to identify appropriate patients for the TULSA Procedure, but importantly, also potentially design better treatment plans and produce better outcomes.
“Approximately 85% of prostate cancers are multifocal, involving two or more distinct index or satellite lesions in different areas of the prostate, while approximately 15% are unifocal, with a single tumor site,” Mathieu Burtnyk, PhD, Profound’s Chief Technology Officer, said in a statement.
“A significant strategic advantage of TULSA-PRO is its ability to support a spectrum of customized, regional ablation plans — from whole-gland, to focal, and everything in between.”
Dr. Burtnyk continued, “We believe PSMA-PET has the potential to enhance multiple stages of the TULSA Procedure, including patient selection, treatment planning, determination of ablation extent and margin definition. Molecular imaging may help identify the approximately 15-25% of patients who are candidates for focal ablation as well as certain higher-risk patients who may remain suitable for whole-gland ablation. Perhaps more significantly still, it may help physicians customize the treatment strategy to each patient’s individual disease characteristics.”
