The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) gave green light this year to a cancer drug intended only for patients whose tumors have a certain genetic signature. It is the first time that this organism approves an oncological treatment based on a biomarker without thinking about the organ of the human body where the tumor originated. The drug is called Pembrolizumab and is manufactured by the company MSD under the brand Keytruda. It was already approved to treat melanoma and other tumors, and can now be prescribed for any advanced solid tumor in children or adults, with one condition: cancer cells must be plagued by mutations in genes that repair DNA, regardless of whether they have developed in the pancreas, the colon or the thyroid, etc.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore (USA) published a study in June that tested the therapy in 86 patients with 12 different cancers, all with the condition cited. 53% responded positively.
The trial showed that tumors that arise in different organs may have more in common than those that grow in the same place, a knowledge that has cost to arrive but that allows a novel and hopeful strategy in the fight against cancer.