Pediatric oncology enters an era of precision medicine.
With the use of high-throughput molecular profiling technologies, precision medicine trials are ongoing for adults with cancer. Similarly, there is an interest in how these techniques can be applied to tumors in children and adolescents to expand our understanding of the biology of pediatric cancers and evaluate the clinical implications of genomic testing for these patients. This article reviews the early studies in pediatric oncology showing the feasibility of this approach, describe the future plans to evaluate the clinical implications in a multicenter clinical trial and identify the challenges of applying genomics in this patient population.
Division of Cancer Treatment and Diagnosis, Clinical Investigations Branch, National Cancer Institute, Rockville, Maryland. Electronic address: Seibelnl@mail.nih.gov.
Nita L
NL
Seibel
Department of Pediatric Oncology, Dana-Farber/Boston Children's Cancer Center and Blood Disorder Center, Boston, Massachusetts.
Katherine
K
Janeway
Texas Children's Cancer Center, Texas Children's Hospital, Houston, Texas; Division of Pediatric Hematology-Oncology, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas.
Carl E
CE
Allen
Department of Pediatric Oncology, Dana-Farber/Boston Children's Cancer Center and Blood Disorder Center, Boston, Massachusetts.
Susan N
SN
Chi
Department of Pediatrics, Oregon Health & Science University, Papé Family Research Institute, Portland, Oregon; Knight Cancer Institute, Oregon Health & Science University, Portland, Oregon.
Yoon-Jae
YJ
Cho
Department of Pediatrics, Columbia University, New York, New York.
Julia L
JL
Glade Bender
Division of Oncology, Children's National Health System, Washington, DC.
AeRang
A
Kim
Department of Pediatrics, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas; Pauline Allen Gill Center for Cancer and Blood Disorders, Children's Health, Dallas, Texas.
Theodore W
TW
Laetsch
Department of Pediatrics, Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Meredith S
MS
Irwin
Division of Cancer Treatment and Diagnosis, Investigational Drug Branch, National Cancer Institute, Rockville, Maryland.
Naoko
N
Takebe
Division of Cancer Treatment and Diagnosis, Cancer Diagnosis Program, National Cancer Institute, Rockville, Maryland.
James V
JV
Tricoli
Department of Pediatrics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas; Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas.
Donald Williams
DW
Parsons
D000293:Adolescent; D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor / Q000235:genetics*; D002648:Child; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling / Q000379:methods; D005820:Genetic Testing; D023281:Genomics; D059014:High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing; D006801:Humans; D008495:Medical Oncology / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D058990:Molecular Targeted Therapy / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D054547:National Cancer Institute (U.S.); D009369:Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000235:genetics; D057285:Precision Medicine / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D014481:United States
D014408:Biomarkers, Tumor
Adolescent and young adult cancer; Genomic profiling; Next-generation sequencing; Pediatric tumors; RNA sequencing; Whole-exome sequencing