Secondary Publication: Role of Molecular Targeted Drugs in Oncology

Abstract

Recent advances in molecular biology have led to the identification of molecules associated with carcinogenesis and the development of molecular-targeted drugs that selectively attack qualitative or quantitative molecular changes in cancer cells. Molecular targeted drugs are classified into "low molecular weight compounds" and "monoclonal antibody drugs" according to the difference in molecular weight. Molecular targeted drugs often have clinically meaningful biomarkers, such as gain- or loss-of-function in cancer-related target genes caused by point mutations, amplification, fusion, and deletion. High therapeutic effects can be expected by detecting driver mutations, which are directly related to carcinogenesis, and by using the corresponding molecular-targeted drugs. In recent years, the development of next-generation sequencing has enabled the simultaneous measurement of hundreds of gene sequences, and an oncogene panel containing cancer-related genes has been covered by the National Health Insurance. Precision medicine is defined as medical care designed to optimize the efficiency or therapeutic benefit for specific patient groups, especially using genetic or molecular profiling.

This article is based on a study reported in the Journal of Tokyo Women's Medical University (in Japanese) 2022;92 (1):1-7.