The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has granted FidoCure an industry-first patent for a novel targeted therapy and biomarker to treat canine bladder cancer.
Early data suggest that the therapy might be more effective than traditional treatments, such as chemotherapy and radiation, according to FidoCure. The Palo Alto, California, company plans to seek U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval for the therapy.
Bladder cancer affects 50,000 to 80,000 U.S. dogs every year, and the disease is often challenging to treat.
FidoCure, which aims to advance veterinary cancer treatment, has eight pending patents covering novel therapies and biomarkers.
According to the company, the patent-protected, AI-driven protocol draws from FidoCure’s proprietary cancer data set — 2 billion data points collected by sequencing and treating thousands of dogs.
“This patent acknowledges the uniqueness of our approach, which has consistently demonstrated that it can transform outcomes for pet dogs with cancer while improving the quality of life for the patients,” said FidoCure CEO Christina Lopes. “Receiving a patent is an important milestone on our mission to increase access to lifesaving treatments for pet dogs with cancer.”
“Bladder cancer in dogs is an unmet need as traditional chemotherapy and radiation therapy are often ineffective, cause toxic side effects and are expensive,” said Dr. Gerald Post, FidoCure’s chief medical officer.