TailorX Trials Opening

Had a meeting today and got updated on the new clinical trial for the OncotypeDX test - its the genomic assay test which provides a genetic "fingerprint" of each person's breast cancer that can tell them their risk of recurrence and whether they can avoid chemo and radiation.

(A similar assay test is being developed for colon cancer.)

The trial is testing the benefits of surgery & hormone therapy vs. surgery & hormone therapy + chemotherapy in breast cancer patients whose OncotypeDX recurrence scores fall in the "middle range" for recurrence. It has tremendous implications in helping many patients avoid chemo and radiation, plus it will create a huge "tissue bank" of patient tumor samples that will allow research to go even farther in developing ways to target treatment based on genetics. Patients will be followed for 10 years.

The trial will be very widely available at nearly every cancer treatment facility in the US.

Read more about it here and if you know someone who is newly diagnosed with ER+/- PR+ lymph node negative breast cancer - encourage them to ask their doctor about participating.

http://www.cancer.gov/clinicaltrials/ECOG-PACCT-1

http://www.genomichealth.com/oncotype/default.aspx