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S. Devarakonda
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PL05 - Genomics: From Research Tool to the Lung Cancer Clinic (ID 76)
- Event: WCLC 2013
- Type: Plenary Session
- Track: Pathology
- Presentations: 1
- Moderators:P. Goldstraw, T. Mok
- Coordinates: 10/30/2013, 16:15 - 17:45, Plenary Hall, Ground Level
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PL05.3 - Challenges for the Clinician (ID 798)
17:10 - 17:35 | Author(s): S. Devarakonda
- Abstract
Abstract
. Although EGFR mutations and fusions involving ALK and ROS1 are targetable by currently approved agents, these alterations are present in less than a fifth of patients with non-squamous NSCLC. Treatment options for the majority of patients remain largely empirical. The urgent need to develop therapies capable of targeting cancers without these alterations can only occur with a better understanding of the molecular biology and cytogenetic alterations. Recently, the lung cancer mutation consortium reported longer survival in patients with adenocarcinoma who underwent multiplexed genomic testing for the detection of alterations in 10 genes, and subsequently received matched targeted treatments. [Johnson et al J Clin Oncol 31, 2013 (suppl; abstr 8019)]. A total of 1,007 patients were screened for at-least one genetic alteration, and an actionable alteration that led to the use of targeted therapies was detected in 28% of these patients. The median survival in these patients was 3.5 years, while patients whose tumors did not harbor actionable alterations had a median survival of 2.1 years. It would be reasonable to assume that adapting NGS technologies, which allow comprehensive screening of the entire genome at a higher resolution, will result in improved outcomes in patients whose tumors do not harbor targetable mutations identifiable by commercially available assays. NGS has allowed a better characterization of lung cancer, with the identification of novel mutations and copy number alterations. Preliminary results from TCGA demonstrated that a significant percentage of patients with lung cancer harbor a targetable abnormality. It is still possible that additional less common mutations or alterations will be discovered once the sequencing of 1000 lung cancer samples is completed by TCGA. The next challenge is the development of novel drugs based on specific targetable abnormalities. Although this strategy may require extensive evaluation and multiple trials targeting distinct molecular subtypes of tumors, this departure from the empirical treatment of lung cancer, probably represents the best hope towards achieving meaningful progress.
