Would you go through a selection procedure?

[Guest guest]

We had a talk by Professor Maitland (of York University) at the Leeds group today.

Th efollowing is the gist of part of what he said:-

One of the questions he asked was would you take a test to check if a particular drug was likely to work for you. I think most of us said yes.

The drug is Doxetaxel which works for about 50% of pateients who have failed adrogen ablation therapy (Zoledex, Lupron). Th ecourse of treatment costs going into thousands of pounds sterling ( and the dollar is approaching 2$ per £)

The test looks for certain genes (Bcl-2 and Clusterin) The latter being active in 65% of hormone refractory patients. It requires a biopsy and takes about 3 days, but it gives a good indication if the doctor and patient are wasting time and if the gene test is negative they are better lokking at other options.

No doubt will correct any misapprehensions I have.