Erlotinib and Pancreatic Adenocarcinoma: Uncertainty and Hope

Excerpt

Despite intensive biomedical research and efforts to standardize multimodal treatment, prognosis of patients with diagnosis of adenocarcinoma of the pancreas is dismal. Yet the overall five year survival rate is approximately 3%. Surgery with curative intent resulting in a complete tumor resection (R0), if feasible by tumor size and absence of metastases, has been the standard of care. Recently, evidence has established the single-agent gemcitabine as the backbone of adjuvant therapy after surgical resection.1 However, patients with pancreas adenocarcinoma after R0 resection and adjuvant gemcitabine face a very high risk of recurrence. To reduce this risk of recurrence and death, current efforts are underway to improve standard treatment failure with neoadjuvant or postoperative chemoradiotherapy and targeted therapy. …