A new target for aggressive bladder cancer found

the Oncology Nurse Advisor take:

A research team may have discovered a new avenue of attack in the battle against aggressive bladder cancer. Researchers based at the Institut Curie in France reviewed genetic data from the tumors of some 400 individuals with bladder cancer, with the aim of focusing on muscle-invasive bladder cancer, a particularly aggressive form of the cancer. They discovered that a portion of the bladder cancer cases, approximately 25%, demonstrated a hyperactive EGFR pathway. When the research team tested mice with this bladder cancer subgroup, they found that application of EGFR inhibitors was effective in slowing tumor growth. EGFR inhibitors are already used to treat breast cancer and lung cancer, and they may be able to help treat certain patients with bladder cancer as well. Although additional research is warranted, treatment with EGFR inhibitors, coupled with radiotherapy, could be a new, viable agent for combatting muscle-invasive bladder cancer.


Results of this study were published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.