Helsinki Urological Cancer Center (HUCC) focuses around the clinical and academic work done at the HUS Helsinki University Hospital and Helsinki University.
Helsinki Urological Cancer Research Group centers around the clinical and academic work done at the HUS Helsinki University Hospital and Helsinki University. Department of urology is the largest in Finland with an catchment area of ca. 1.5M inhabitants and 25 staff members. Our center is a tertiary referral center for centralized surgery (e.g. Cystectomy, prostatectomy, urethraplasty, RPLND) but at the same time also responsible for the primary diagnostics, treatments and follow-up of all urological cancers in greater Helsinki area.
Our research at Helsinki Urological Cancer Center has the following main objectives:
1. (Mainly) tissue biomarkers of prognosis, prediction and treatment resistance in urological cancer.
2. Combine marker studies with registry data, imaging (MRI) and image analysis (Machine learning/AI augmented).
3. Improved diagnostics and more precise treatment decisions.
4. Urological malignancies:
- Prostate cancer
- Urothelial (bladder) cancer
- Kidney (renal cell) cancer
- Testicular cancer
- Penile cancer
Clinical samples
Clinical samples are the backbone of our research at Helsinki Urological Cancer Center (HUCC):
- Renal cell carcinoma TMA
- Helsinki biobank samples, yy. 2006-2013
- Surgical treatment. recurrence vs. non-recurrence
- External validation: Turku RCC-TMA
- Prostate cancer TMAs
- Helsinki TMA I
- Surgical treatment, median of 16 years follow-up, disease-specific survival (DSS)
- MRIxRALP TMA
- Imaging detected Pca, 2014-2015
- MRI images & scanned histological slides
- Helsinki TMA II
- Gleason 7-8, cases vs. controls, median 9 years follow-up, metastasis & disease-specific survival (DSS)
- Helsinki TMA I
- Bladder cancer TMA
- Neoadjuvant treated urothelial carcinomas, treatment resistance
- Helsinki TMA
- Turku TMA
- Neoadjuvant treated urothelial carcinomas, treatment resistance
- Prospective cohorts – multiple sample types
- HUB
- DEDUCER
- ProScreen
Affiliates
Helsinki Urological Cancer Center (HUCC) affiliates with the following clinical sites:
HUS Department of urology (the primary clinical site for diagnostics, treatments and follow-up of urological cancer patients).
HUS Department of radiology (clinical imaging: US, CT and MRI)
HUS Isotope unit (bone scan, PET scans)
HUS Department of pathology (pathology)
HUS Comprehensive Cancer Center (radiotherapy and chemotherapy)
Collaborators
Helsinki Biobank
FIMM. Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland
More about HUCC
Our research groups
Prostate Cancer
Prostate cancer research group, co-led by assistant professor Antti Rannikko (clinical site) and associate professor Tuomas Mirtti (pathology and preclinical site) is the core of the Helsinki Prostate Cancer Research Center (PCRC).
Kidney Cancer
Kidney cancer research group is an active and growing group of researchers led by associate professor Harry Nisen (urology). The group has several retrospective and prospective studies and trials ongoing and on the pipeline. It actively collaborates with local, national and international experts in clinical, translational and preclinical collaborative projects.
Bladder Cancer
Bladder cancer group is co-led by urologist, PhD, Jukka Sairanen (invasive bladder cancer) and urologist, PhD, Riikka Järvinen (superficial bladder cancer).
The group has several retrospective and prospective studies and trials ongoing and on the pipeline. It actively collaborates with local, national and international experts in clinical, translational and preclinical collaborative projects.
Testicular Cancer
Penile cancer research group is led by urologist, PhD, Hanna Vasarainen.
