Qualification for TKI-EGFR inhibitors treatment in a patient diagnosed with adenocarcinoma of the lung with activating mutation in EGFR gene

Abstract

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in Poland and other development counties both in females and males population. Histopathological diagnosis and immunochemistry examination of adenocarcinoma should not finish a diagnostic process, because in patients with adenocarcinoma, the detection of EGFR activating mutation become a diagnostic standard. Currently the sensitive methods based on real time PCR techniques for EGFR mutation analysis are used in laboratory practice. Evaluation of EGFR mutation determines the possibility of patients` qualification to molecularly targeted therapies. Erlotinib, the reversible tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI-EGFR) is effective agent both in first line of treatment and maintenance therapy in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients, mainly with activating EGFR mutations in tumor cells.