Over the past 8 years, about 9,000 cancer cases have been analyzed for entire exon in the Project HOPE, which has led to the development of the Pharma Valley Project as well as the SRL-Shizuoka Cancer Center Collaborative Research Organization. In addition, it has contributed to building out the cancer genome database for the Japanese, and the development of the“Fuji-no-kuni HOPE Onco-PanelR.”As such, the clinical application of the research results for each patient is now getting very close. Based on the whole accumulation of knowledge and insights from the Project HOPE for years, the major 3 cancer centers in Japan, namely the National Cancer Center Hospital, the Cancer Institute Hospital and the Shizuoka Cancer Center have decided to participate in the research project for the whole genome analysis, which is a national project applied by the Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development (AMED). This participation means nothing other than the contribution to Japan’s “Action Plan for Whole Genome Analysis.” This research project is to analyze entire exon of cancer patients and to give them back the research results for utilizing them for their cancer treatments. This 2-year-long research project is supposed to extract agendas before the actual implementation for the health insurance-covered medicine. Although it is assumed that only 1 % of all the patients participating in this research project have gene mutations positive for hereditary cancers, it will be beneficial for the patients and their families to take the genomic tests as they can be effective for early detection and treatments.
