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Copyright ©The Author(s) 2017. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Respirol. Jul 28, 2017; 7(2): 35-38
Published online Jul 28, 2017. doi: 10.5320/wjr.v7.i2.35
Is the determination of ctDNA a scientific “spy” that foresees cancer?
Joana Espiga de Macedo, Manuela Machado
Joana Espiga de Macedo, Department of Medical Oncology, Centro Hospitalar de Entre Douro e Vouga, 4520-211 Santa Maria da Feira, Portugal
Manuela Machado, Department of Medical Oncology, Portuguese Institute of Oncology, 4200-072 Oporto, Portugal
Author contributions: de Macedo JE and Machado M contributed to article conception, writing, editing and reviewing the final approval of the article.
Conflict-of-interest statement: Joana Espiga de Macedo and Manuela Machado have received fees for serving as a speaker, such as consultant and/or an advisory board member for Celgene, Merck, BMS, Amgen and Roche.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Joana Espiga de Macedo, MD, Consultant of Medical Oncology, Department of Medical Oncology, Centro Hospitalar de Entre Douro e Vouga, Rua Dr. Cândido de Pinho, 4520-211 Santa Maria Da Feira, Portugal. joana.macedo@chedv.min-saude.pt
Telephone: +351-93-6050138 Fax: +351-25-6373867
Received: April 12, 2017
Peer-review started: May 3, 2017
First decision: May 23, 2017
Revised: June 5, 2017
Accepted: June 30, 2017
Article in press: July 1, 2017
Published online: July 28, 2017
Core Tip

Core tip: With the increase development of molecular medicine we may further change our clinical rational to a precise cancer medicine rational way. Consequently, we may improve the quality of life of our patients, with less toxicity, more cost-effectiveness decisions and above all improve response rate and survival. Defining the complete genomic “picture” of all cancerous lesions, in the near future as a standard of care, will require all genetic information concerning each individual cancer.