Department of Medical Oncology, Christie NHS Foundation Trust, Manchester M20 4BX, UK ; School of Cancer and Imaging Sciences, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, UK.
Gastroenterol Res Pract. 2012;2012:564741. doi: 10.1155/2012/564741. Epub 2012 Sep 9.
The development of personalised therapy and mechanism-targeted agents in oncology mandates the identification of the patient populations most likely to benefit from therapy. This paper discusses the increasing evidence as to the heterogeneity of the group of diseases called colorectal cancer. Differences in the aetiology and epidemiology of proximal and distal cancers are reflected in different clinical behaviour, histopathology, and molecular characteristics of these tumours. This may impact response both to standard cytotoxic therapies and mechanism-targeted agents. This disease heterogeneity leads to challenges in the design of clinical trials to assess novel therapies in the treatment of "colorectal cancer."
肿瘤学中个性化治疗和机制靶向药物的发展需要确定最有可能从治疗中获益的患者群体。本文讨论了越来越多的证据表明，被称为结直肠癌的疾病群体存在异质性。近端和远端癌症的病因和流行病学差异反映在这些肿瘤的不同临床行为、组织病理学和分子特征上。这可能会影响对标准细胞毒性疗法和机制靶向药物的反应。这种疾病异质性给评估新型疗法治疗“结直肠癌”的临床试验设计带来了挑战。
