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Biospecimens and Organoid Services
Offering tissue procurement, organoid and drug screening services
Tissue Procurement Center
The Tissue Procurement Center at the HFGCCRI, was established in 2003, in collaboration with the Department of Pathology at CC. The program is supported by dedicated research coordinators embedded within disease teams who facilitate patient screening, consent, and real-time sample collection. Across all cancer sites, the program enrolls approximately 800 patients per year, with consent rates approaching ~60% of eligible patients, enabling robust accrual of clinically annotated biospecimens. A broad, IRB-approved tissue procurement protocol enables the prospective collection and banking of diverse specimen types, including bronchoalveolar lavage, blood, tissue, urine, and ascites, obtained during routine clinical care. Standardized processes are in place for protocol development, regulatory approval, and specimen handling. All specimens are barcoded at collection, processed, and stored under uniform SOPs, with a centralized manifest and chain-of-custody tracking system to ensure specimen integrity, traceability, and compliance. Clinical, imaging, and outcomes data are obtained through secure access to the electronic medical record and institutional data systems, enabling comprehensive annotation of biospecimens. This coordinated infrastructure ensures efficient, compliant, and scalable biospecimen collection to support biomarker validation and regulatory-grade studies.
Organoid Biobank and Drug Screening Services
Organoids are three-dimensional models developed directly from a patient’s tumor that retain important features of the original cancer and reflect the diversity of tumors seen in clinical practice. Unlike animal models and established cancer cell lines, organoids are freshly derived from human tumors and cultured in a supportive framework that mimics the human body. This makes them more reliable predictors of which drugs will work, and which types of patients are most likely to benefit.
We provide drug screening using standardized operating procedures for organoid preparation, treatment, and response assessment. Our integrated workflow measures tumor growth, metabolism, and cell death in the same culture to maximize the information obtained from limited patient tissue. Standard and investigational therapies can be tested across models from multiple patients to determine which tumors are sensitive and which are resistant, supporting drug development and efforts to get the right treatment to the right patient. For more information contact CTCR@ChristianaCare.org
Contact Us
Helen F. Graham Cancer Center & Research Institute
4701 Ogletown-Stanton Road
Suite 2200
Newark, DE 19713
