Optimata Presents Virtual Patient That Predicts Response to Cancer Drugs at UK Conference

Optimata Ltd., developer of the OPTIMATA VIRTUAL PATIENT® proprietary modeling technology for drug development and personalized medicine, today announced that Prof. Zvia Agur, Founder and CSO, has been invited to speak at the “Speed and Safety in Drug Discovery” conference to be held at the Royal Society, London, on November 26, 2008

Prof. Agur will present studies showing how in silico methods can improve cancer drug safety and efficacy. In one study, Optmata’s Virtual Patient technology was used to precisely predict neutropenia grade in individual patients undergoing chemotherapy treatment by docetaxel (Taxotere).

“The model enables the clinician to tailor an individual docetaxel monotherapy or combination regimen for a patient, thus increasing the patient's safety and replacing trial-and error treatment planning by a more systematic methodology.” said Prof Agur.
In another personalized medicine pilot study, the Virtual Patient technology significantly extended survival and quality of life of an oncology patient treated by a combination of docetaxel and bevacizumab (Avastine).

At the conference, world-leading experts will discuss how to get drugs into the clinic faster and more safely.
Additional information can be found at:
http://www.drugtestingconference.com/programme.html

About Prof. Zvia Agur and Optimata Ltd.
Prof. Agur is a leader in the field of medical biomathematics and among the pioneers of mathematical oncology. For more than 30 years she has been developing mathematical methods for improving the therapy of cancer and infectious diseases.

Professor Agur founded Optimata Ltd whose mission is to rationalize drug development and medicine by tailoring the most suitable drug treatments to specific patient-populations and to individuals. The company has developed, validated and commercialized a predictive biosimulations technology - Optimata Virtual Patient® (OVP) - comprising computer-implemented mathematical models of physiological, pathological and pharmacological processes in a patient’s body.