In this podcast, Marina Parry, ESMO Open Digital Editor, speaks to Elana Anastasio, Partnership Outreach Manager, and Brett Tomson, Scientific Outreach Manager, both from the Metastatic Breast Cancer (MBC) Project team at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.The MBCproject is a novel model of a patient-partnered initiative whose aim is to accelerate the understanding of metastatic breast cancer by generating a massive open database of genomic information from patients’ tumour samples, alongside abstracted clinical information, and patient-reported data. In the podcast, we discuss the challenges faced by the team, the enthusiasm they were met with from patients, the logistical and operational hurdles they have overcome, the importance of finding a common language and building trust between participants and researchers, the role of social media and patient advocates, as well as the other patient-partnered projects this team has since initiated.

The MBCproject organisers want to hear back from scientists and researchers about ideas or questions they have on how to use the existing data or new data you think would be good to try and generate. They encourage listeners to get in touch! Their website is https://www.mbcproject.org.