Drawing upon more than 20 years of experience in the healthcare sector, Jeffrey Goffman serves as chairman and CEO of Integrated Oncology Network, through which he provides management advice to hospitals and cancer centers nationwide. Additionally, Jeffrey Goffman has served as chairman of the board for CureDuchenne since 2010.
2. Introduction
Drawing upon more than 20 years of experience in the healthcare
sector, Jeffrey Goffman serves as chairman and CEO of Integrated
Oncology Network, through which he provides management advice
to hospitals and cancer centers nationwide. Additionally, Jeffrey
Goffman has served as chairman of the board for CureDuchenne
since 2010.
Since its establishment, CureDuchenne has leveraged more than $1.3
billion in follow-on investment to support research designed to treat
and cure Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD). Among its most
recent investments, the nonprofit pledged financial support to
Avidity Biosciences, which is working toward developing a new
precision medicine class based upon antibody-oligonucleotide
conjugates (AOC). CureDuchenne's funding will be specifically used to
further the company's AOC technology and its potential in the
treatment of patients with DMD.
3. CureDuchenne
By employing antibody-mediated uptake in muscle cells, AOCs
drastically increase splice skipping oligonucleotides activity
which, in turn, should allow for less frequent dosing as well as
decreased dosage levels among patients. The groundbreaking
science also has the potential to address similar concerns for
other muscle diseases. According to CureDuchenne founder
and CEO Debra Miller, only 13 percent of Duchenne patients
use approved treatment options for exon 51, but Avidity's work
could lead to the approval of several more effective therapies
to treat Duchenne patients with diverse needs.