Improving treatment decisions to improve brain tumor outcomes

A National Cancer Institute-funded research team that includes senior investigator Dr. Walter J. Curran, Jr., executive director of Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University, announced January 19th that a genetic marker in brain tumors should be evaluated to determine the best treatment plan for patients with a rare type of brain tumor.

In their phase III trial, the team found that anaplastic oligodendroglioma patients that also have a genetic abnormality – the 1p19q co-deletion – survived about twice as long as average (14.7 compared with 7.3 years) when treated initially with both chemotherapy and radiation.  Additionally, tumor patients with the genetic abnormality survived significantly longer (more than 7 years) than those without the co-deletion (2.8 years).

Details of the findings and study design are available here.

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