DxS is working in partnership with Exiqon Diagnostics to present a free workshop on personalised cancer therapy, taking place on May 29 at the Rosen Plaza Hotel in Orlando, Florida.
The workshop coincides with the start of the 2009 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting in Orlando, and is entitled 'Personalising Cancer Therapy: KRAS and other Predictive Assays'.
Three speakers will discuss the value of predictive biomarkers in oncology - focusing on KRAS and EGFR - in terms of their place in the clinical sphere, the relationship to drug response, and the more practical application of the tests in a laboratory environment.
Dr Axel Grothey, Professor of Oncology at Mayo Clinic, will chair the workshop and present a session on KRAS patient testing.
Other speakers include Dr Stanley Hamilton, Professor and Head of the Division of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at M D Anderson Cancer Center, who will discuss the practical application of predictive biomarkers, and Dr Alex Adjei, chairman, Department of Medicine at Roswell Park Cancer Institute, who will discuss mutations in the EGFR gene and response to anti-EGFR therapies.
Workshop participants will become familiar with the methods and implications of KRAS mutation testing for the oncologist, pathologist and patient, as well as mutations in other relevent genes, including EGFR, BRAF and PI3K, which can affect response to targeted therapies.
Additionally, information will be presented on other predictive assays based on phenotyping, such as in-vitro drug response assays (EDR assay offered by Exiqon Diagnostics) and genotyping (targeted molecular diagnostics assays), available for predicting response to cytotoxic drugs and targeted therapies.
