Exploring High Sensitivity ctDNA Assays in Genitourinary Malignancies

Arnab Basu, MD, MPH, FACP, assistant professor in genitourinary medical oncology at the University of Alabama in Birmingham, provides a brief overview regarding his research on high sensitivity circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) assays in genitourinary malignancies.

This new generation of circulating DNA tests, high sensitivity ctDNA, is now becoming available commercially. Basu shares that multiple studies have already been reported in urothelial, renal, and recently testicular carcinoma.

Here, he also delves into some of the exciting work being done and what prompted his interest in studying the application of ctDNA in this space.

Transcription:

0:09 I am a professor of genitourinary oncology, so I see a lot of kidney cancer, bladder cancer, prostate cancer, and there have been a lot of exciting data with a new generation of ctDNA tests called the minimal residual disease tests, which have high sensitivity and specificity to find micrometastatic disease. We have done some work, a lot of it is retrospective, but also some perspective work, in bringing these into the GU malignancies. Most of our work is in urothelial carcinoma, but we have also looked at penile cancer, urethral cancer, and also renal cell carcinoma, with some interesting results.

0:57 | It is an interesting story because it came from doing a few [gastrointestinal (GI)] cases as a young oncologist when I had just joined. I had some patients [with] colorectal cancer who had questionable risk factors on recurrence. As we were working through it with my GI colleagues, high sensitivity ctDNA was just coming into colorectal at that time, so I became familiar serendipitously with that, and brought that into the GU clinic as well.

REFERENCE

Patel KR, Rais-Bahrami S, Basu A. High sensitivity ctDNA assays in genitourinary malignancies: current evidence and future directions. Oncologist. 2024;29(9):731-737. doi:10.1093/oncolo/oyae198