Biomarkers to Test for in Patients With Colorectal Cancer

Olumide B. Gbolahan, MBBS, MSc, assistant professor in the Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology at Emory University School of Medicine, discusses the key biomarkers oncologists should test for to determine the optimal treatment for patients with colorectal cancer (CRC).

According to Gbolahan, these biomarkers can be identified with circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) assays. Aside from mismatch repair protein status, he explains that looking for BRAF, KRAS, and HER2 mutations is important.

Transcript:

0:08 | The biomarkers will fall into two broad categories; the biomarkers that would predict response to treatments, whatever treatment we offer patients, and then also biomarkers that may help us with prognostication.

0:27 | I think that the ctDNA assays are adding information to prognostication. Maybe. We don't know yet. That will be helpful to determine how patients respond to therapy. But I think it's important that as a biomarker for prognosis, everybody should be tested for mismatch repair protein status on their tumors. I think that this is important for not just prognosis. Yes, it's useful for making decisions about genetic counseling bonds, depending on the stage of the disease. For instance, for stage four cancers and more and more even for colorectal cancer as resectable. This is also useful for picking treatment options in terms of chemotherapy versus immunotherapy. So, mismatch repair protein status is a very useful marker in colorectal cancer. And there are other genetic tests or genomic tests that we do that may be helpful that are helpful for prognosis and prediction of response to treatments like BRAF mutation status, KRAS, mutation status and things like that HER2 also do.