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Weill Cornell Medicine to offer test that may pinpoint more precise treatments
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Patients with advanced-stage cancer who undergo treatment at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center soon will have the chance to undergo a test that scans thousands of their genes.
The EXaCT-1 test identifies alterations with tumors at a considerably greater magnitude than other technologies, which could lead to the identification of more precise treatments, according to a Weill Cornell-issued press release.
The New York State Department of Health recently granted Weill Cornell approval to use the EXaCT-1 test, developed by the institution’s precision medicine team.
Typically, institutions use a sequencing test that examines 50 to 400 genes within a sample of a patient’s tumor to look for disease characteristics that physicians know can be effectively treated with certain drugs or technologies.
The EXaCT-1 has the ability to look at more than 21,000 genes in both healthy and malignant cells, which could allow researchers the opportunity to find alterations in the cancer-development process in unexpected regions of the exome.
This test can be effective for patients with advanced cancer for whom other treatments have failed.
“That’s the nice thing about sequencing the entire tumor genome — we cover genes that other tests will miss,” Olivier Elemento, PhD, associate professor of physiology and biophysics at Weill Cornell Medical College, said in the press release. “This test is ideal for patients with advanced cancer because it allows us to identify mutations that may be related to the resistance of their disease, and helps us to pinpoint the best way to treat them.”
The screen requires a blood sample, as well as a sample of their tumor.
Computational biologists at Caryl and Israel Englander Institute for Precision Medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine will analyze data from these samples and issue a report that summarizes key data and clinical findings.
After members of the precision medicine team has reviewed the results, they will consult with the patient’s oncologist at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell to decide which treatment options and clinical trials may best target the patient’s disease.
“We're able to do this quickly enough that we can make a significant impact on a patient's treatment plan,” Mark A. Rubin, MD, head of precision medicine at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell, said in the press release. “This means that a patient who's seen by a doctor and started on a treatment will get their results back quickly enough to potentially influence their treatment protocol if the results uncover something new.”