The Integral Oncology Center Clara Campal HM CIOCC has coordinated a research project, published in the Journal of Thoracic Oncology, which has allowed defining a new protocol to identify patients with ROS1-positive lung cancer. The ROSING study has had the participation of 23 centers throughout Spain and “opens a door to improve the identification of these patients and, therefore, to enable them to face the treatments with better guarantees,” according to the researchers.
The therapies that are currently practiced in patients with an advanced tumor in the lung and who present an alteration of the ROS1 gene are based on the administration of drugs aimed at combating it specifically, and are giving a “very positive” clinical response, so ROS1 has become an important biomarker for the treatment of the disease, according to the CIOCC in a statement.
Therefore, from the hospital there was a need to validate the diagnostic methods in order to identify the candidates and increase the number of affected people who can benefit from these treatments.
The research has been coordinated by the director of the Laboratory of Therapeutic Targets of the center, Fernando López-Ríos, and according to their results, the best way to recognize ROS1-positive patients is an immunohistochemical technique with the SP384 antibody, which is a “ excellent ”screening method. Subsequently, it is recommended to confirm the alteration of this gene by fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) or a molecular directed sequencing test based on the RNA study.