Chapters authored
Fine-Needle Aspirates v2.0 — The Molecular Era
Tissue biopsies are required for diagnosis, prognosis, and to measure individual drug response markers for patient management. For pancreatic adenocarcinoma, surgically harvested tissues are often used to collect data and perform genomic analysis to identify driver oncogenes and specific mutations, or to quantify a handpick of (micro)RNAs and proteins biomarkers. However, such strategy raises many concerns not only because 80% of patients diagnosed with pancreatic adenocarcinoma are not eligible for surgery, meaning that biopsies are not collected, but also because repeated core biopsies are related to higher risk of morbidity, are expensive and logistics can be limiting. Alternative sample collection methods include fine-needle aspirates (FNA) collected under endoscopic ultrasound (EUS). In this chapter, we will describe how EUS-FNA material can be a wealthy source of biomarkers for pancreatic cancer patient management. In greater details, we will review how DNA, micro(RNA), or protein analysis can help stratify pancreatic adenocarcinoma patients, from single events analysis, to cutting-edge, high-throughput studies.
Part of the book: Endoscopy