Your Health

New and Better Ways to Target Cancer Cells

Posted: 2/9/2012

Molecular profiling now provides doctors with detailed, biomarker information associated with a patient’s specific cancer and the associated treatment options likelier to do more good and less harm.

(NAPSI)—Doctors have a new way to take aim at cancer.

That’s because a new technology can now be used to determine which cancer therapies are more likely to be effective, and which therapies are unlikely to be effective, in treating a patient’s specific cancer.

How It Works

It’s done through something called molecular profiling. Caris Target Now™ evidence-based molecular profiling identifies the genetic and molecular structure—also called biomarkers or targets—of the tumor and then matches this complex information to published studies from the world’s leading cancer researchers. This very detailed information is then compared with available cancer drug options, listing those that are more likely to help the patient, and singling out the ones that are not likely to work. It can also help uncover important therapies that might not have even been considered.

Unfortunately, across the population, the response rate for cancer drugs can be as low as 5 percent. Clearly, there is a need to do better. By identifying biomarker targets associated with response to drug therapy, molecular profiling helps doctors better target cancer therapy selection and personalize cancer care.

This type of personalized cancer care has the potential to increase the likelihood of a favorable patient response, meaning a potentially longer and better life for that patient. In addition, this type of care also holds promise for reducing the staggering healthcare costs connected to the disease by using drugs with a higher likelihood of working in each patient.

Who Benefits

Molecular profiling can be applied to patients with all types of cancer, including people with aggressive disease, rare cancers or other limits on treatment options. In addition, molecular profiling can help physicians and their patients navigate various treatment options that may be available when the path is not clear. Only a doctor can help determine to what extent molecular profiling will be useful for a particular patient.

Clinical Study Support

One multicenter study, conducted by Caris Life Sciences, a molecular profiling laboratory offering services nationwide, was recently published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. This study showed that, even in patients with late-stage cancer, Caris Target Now™ molecular profiling increased progression-free survival from various cancers in 27 percent of the 86 patients they studied by targeting therapy selection in this way, versus the previous therapy on which they progressed.

Learn More

You can get more information about this new technology, and whether it can be useful for you, from your doctor and online at www.mycancer.com.

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