[Tumour banks: a major stake for both patient care and research]

Tumour banks are created by pathology and haematology departments, using cell and tissue samples from patients, obtained for diagnostic purpose, and secondarily requalified for research. These banks are the most important source of human samples for research. It appears important to maintain research programs on human tissues and cells, since cell lines and animal models only partly reflect human lesions. Tumours banks are also important for patient care, since they allow patients to benefit from recent therapeutic advances. Indeed some drugs only kill some tumour cells, which can be identified from the initial tumour samples by means of specific markers. Moreover, tumours banks are the choice tool for transferring scientific discoveries to daily patients care in oncology.