Cancer is a chronic disease that makes people shiver, and modern medicine is still unable to overcome it. Patients not only bear the pain caused by the disease and increase the psychological burden, but also pay high treatment costs, which may eventually cause both human and financial losses. Cancer is not formed all at once, it is a slow development process, and prevention in advance can reduce the risk of cancer. Now there is a genetic test in medicine to assess the risk of cancer and the efficacy of treatment. Let’s take a look.

What is genetic testing?

Gene testing is mainly based on blood collection and DNA extraction from organisms to provide sufficient information support for medical and health care. For the physical examination of healthy people, blood, saliva, secretions or urine can be tested to extract DNA material to find out whether the sequence gene is defective or whether the functional performance is normal. A final diagnosis was finally reached.

Foreign star Angelina Jolie used genetic testing to find out that she was at risk of cancer, and received timely treatment to reduce the risk of cancer. It is qualitatively different from ordinary physical examination. Physical examination is to find existing health risks, while genetic testing can predict the risk of disease.

Why do I need genetic testing?

1. Guided use of tumor-targeted drugs

After diagnosis by histopathology, or target Clinical application of antitumor drugs can only be done after spot detection. Targeted drugs can precisely act on the site of specific gene mutation and directly kill tumor cells without affecting normal cells and tissues. However, targeted drugs are prone to drug resistance. In this case, genetic testing is required to analyze gene mutation status, remove sensitive and resistant mutations, and optimize targeted drug treatment plans.

2. Evaluating the efficacy of immunotherapy

Immunotherapy is a new type of cancer treatment means for relapsed or refractory cancer. The clinically used drugs are PD-1 inhibitors, which are expensive and have an effective rate of about 20% for most solid tumors. However, not all patients can use such drugs, and blind use can increase the economic burden, resulting in loss of both human and financial resources. In order to assess whether immunotherapy is effective, tumor genetic testing should be done in advance.

3. Know if there is a genetic risk for cancer strong>

Some mutations in cancer patients are easy to inherit, so it is necessary to detect whether they carry genetic susceptibility gene mutations to understand whether cancer is related to heredity.

4. Assess prognosis and recurrence risk

Gene status can affect cancer prognosis, for example For example, if breast cancer patients have HER2 gene amplification, the prognosis is poor. Genetic testing can dynamically monitor the treatment effect, accurately assess the survival time of patients, and determine the risk of recurrence.

5. Increase the chance of healing< /p>

So far, there are relatively few targeted drugs that can be taken, and most of them are still in clinical trials. Through genetic testing, a patient’s genes can be understood, and then potential drugs can be provided to increase the hope of treatment.

Who needs genetic testing?

1. Cancer patients

Patients who plan to do targeted drug therapy or immune adjuvant therapy before surgery; After surgery, monitor whether there is minimal residual disease; patients who cannot be operated at all and are planning to receive immunotherapy or targeted therapy; monitoring for recurrence after treatment; after drug resistance occurs, it is necessary to change the drug and continue to receive immunotherapy and targeted therapy , the above population needs to do genetic testing.

2, family members

In the family, a member of the family is diagnosed with cancer at a young age; a rare cancer in the immediate family, cancer is closely related to heredity; multiple relatives in the family have the same cancer; Cancer cases are related to the same gene mutation; if it is found to be related to hereditary cancer, such as familial gastrointestinal polyps or adenomatous polyps, then family members need to undergo genetic testing.

A message from a family doctor

Gene testing is useful for healthy people to get a general understanding of their genetic status and assess the risk of disease; Said, the treatment plan can be optimized. It is worth reminding that if it is determined that there is a hereditary cancer in the family, then family members need to do genetic testing to prevent it in advance.

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