The chief of surgical oncology at the UK Markey Cancer Center discussed liquid biopsies and their potential importance for diagnosing gastric cancer.
Joseph Kim, MD, chief of the division of surgical oncology at the UK Markey Cancer Center, spoke about the importance of liquid biopsies, specifically in gastric cancer, at the 2020 Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium, held January 23-25, in San Francisco, California.
Transcription:
Currently, liquid biopsies are really in their infancy in diagnostics for (gastrointestinal) cancers, especially gastric cancer. Liquid biopsies are being tested in a number of cancers, but I think it’s particularly important for gastric cancer where it may be difficult to get enough tissue to do all of the genetic testing that we need, and so the liquid biopsies provide an avenue for us to get that data which would potentially help change the type of treatments that are offered for patients with gastric cancer.