The COBRA Bladder Cancer Treatment Study

Testing new treatments for better outcomes from bladder cancer.

Professor Rakesh Heer is leading this major trial funded by the NIHR for approximately £3M to test whether a new treatment is safer and more effective than the current therapy for bladder cancers.

It has become standard practice to treat many patients with bladder cancer with BCG, a type of immunotherapy given directly into the bladder. While effective for many, BCG can cause significant side-effects such as marked urinary symptoms from bladder irritation and in a significant proportion, the treatment is not completed.

The COBRA trial is comparing BCG with a promising new approach using two chemotherapy drugs, Gemcitabine and Docetaxel (“Gem-Doce”). These will also be delivered as washes directly into the bladder. Researchers are testing the potential of the treatment to prevent recurrence, reduce progression and improve quality of life. 

Over the next five years, men and women taking part in the trial will be monitored closely to measure cancer control, side-effects and long term outcomes.

“Our goal is simple”, says Professor Heer. “We want to give patients a treatment that is at least as effective as BCG at stopping cancer from returning, but with fewer side-effects. Gem-Doce could become a new standard of care for patients”.