Endocrine Surgery Research Laboratory, Department of Surgery, University of Wisconsin, H4/722 Clinical Science Center, 600 Highland Avenue, Madison, WI 53792, USA.
J Oncol. 2009;2009:183031. doi: 10.1155/2009/183031. Epub 2009 Dec 24.
Medullary thyroid cancer (MTC) is a rare neuroendocrine neoplasm that accounts for approximately 5% of all thyroid malignancies. The natural history of MTC is characterized by early lymph node and distant metastases, making complete surgical cure often impossible. Conventional chemotherapy and external beam radiation have been largely ineffective in altering the natural history of MTC. Therefore, there is a great need to develop novel therapeutic strategies to affect symptom control and reduce tumor burden in patients with widely disseminated disease. Here, we review several pathways which have been shown to be vital in MTC tumorigenesis and focus on the pathways of interest for which targeted drug therapies are currently being developed.
甲状腺髓样癌（MTC）是一种罕见的神经内分泌肿瘤，约占所有甲状腺恶性肿瘤的 5%。MTC 的自然病程以早期淋巴结和远处转移为特征，因此通常无法完全手术治愈。传统的化疗和外照射在改变 MTC 的自然病程方面效果甚微。因此，迫切需要开发新的治疗策略，以控制症状并减轻广泛播散性疾病患者的肿瘤负担。在这里，我们回顾了一些已被证明对 MTC 肿瘤发生至关重要的途径，并重点介绍了目前正在开发针对这些途径的靶向药物治疗的途径。
