The four sessions described here are examples of the Annual Meeting’s coverage of practice-changing science and directions for the future.

What: Customized Cancer Treatment: A Systems Biology Approach to Drug Selection

Who: John Mendelsohn, MD, President, MD Anderson Cancer Center; Jeffrey M. Trent, PhD, TGen; Andrea Califan, PhD, Columbia University

This Education Session will cover advances in knowledge, technology, and new drug development in customizing cancer treatment. The speakers will also discuss the challenges facing clinicians and researchers in selecting targets:

• How do we distinguish aberrant genes that are “drivers” from those that are “passengers?”
• Should we measure gene mutations and copy number, gene regulation, transcription of genes, or the protein products of genes, or are all of these parameters required?
• How do we balance patient risks and benefits in dealing with necessarily imprecise gene sequencing assays, in allowing patients with advanced incurable disease access to experimental drugs in an N = 1 experiment, and in rapidly moving forward with combinations of targeted therapies?

What: Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Testing for Cancer: What Physicians Need to Know

Who: Sancy Leachman, MD, PhD, Huntsman Cancer Institute; Daniel B. Vorhaus, JD, Editor, Genomics Law Report; Stacy W. Gray, MD, AM, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute; Angela R. Bradbury, MD, Fox Chase Cancer Center.

Genetic testing available directly to consumers is one of the most rapidly advancing areas of personalized genomics. This Education Session will address the evolution and current state of technology, analysis, and reporting of test results to patients. Presenters will update clinicians about genetic tests now available to consumers, how consumers are using the tests, and how regulation of the tests is changing.

Attendees will learn about some of the specific tests that physicians are likely to see, how DNA is collected, whether testing requires a physician intermediary, costs involved, and how understandable the results are to laypersons.

What: How to Participate in Clinical Research across Borders

Who: Eduardo Cazap, MD, PhD, President, International Union Against Cancer; Martine J. Piccart-Gebhart, MD, PhD, Jules Bordet Institute; Edward Lloyd Trimble, MD; National Cancer Institute; Jean-Yves Blay, MD, PhD, Centre Leon Bérard; Henry Leonidas Gomez, MD, Instituto Nacional de Enfermedades Neoplasicas

This Extended Education Session will address how to improve and facilitate global research in light of the barriers and challenges faced by researchers in developing countries. Presenters will discuss the importance of developing and promoting independent and public funding of clinical trials internationally.

In contrast to industry-supported clinical trials in the developed world that aim to determine the effectiveness of a new product in preparation for marketing, the most important objective of a publicly supported system of cancer clinical trials is identifying optimal therapies.

The presenters will describe teams of cancer care professionals in developing countries and the tools and knowledge needed to conduct clinical research in such environments. They will also discuss opportunities for oncology fellows, junior faculty, and basic and clinical researchers in developed countries to become involved in cancer research internationally.

What: PARP Inhibitors, DNA Repair, and Beyond: Theory Meets Reality in the Clinic

Who:  Michael B. Kastan, MD, PhD, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital; Alan Ashworth, PhD, FRS, Institute of Cancer Research; Judy Garber, MD, MPH, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

Presenters of this Education Session will address how gene products that are critical in responding to DNA damage in normal cells provide new targets for research efforts to enhance the efficacy of DNA-targeted therapy.

Synergistic possibilities arise because these genes are important in both tumor development and tumor therapy—many tumors are defective in one or more DNA repair genes because the gene mutation contributed to the development of the tumor itself.

The presenters will describe how these mutations serve as a potential Achilles’ heel of the tumor, in that tumors with a defect in one repair pathway are particularly sensitive to inhibition of a different repair pathway, presumably because that second repair pathway compensates for the loss of function associated with the first mutation.

To learn more about the 2011 Annual Meeting and to register, visit chicago2011.asco.org. ■