1. Desmoplastic Small Round Cell Tumor: A Review of Main Molecular Abnormalities and Emerging Therapy
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Celso Abdon Lopes de Mello, Samuel Aguiar, Felipe D'Almeida Costa, Fernando Augusto Batista Campos, Maria Nirvana Formiga, Cassia Silva, Antonio Geraldo Nascimento, Giovana Tardin Torrezan, Suely Akiko Nakagawa, Maria Paula Curado, Ulisses Ribaldo Nicolau, Ademar Lopes, Maria Leticia Gobo Silva, and Tiago G. Santos
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0301 basic medicine ,Oncology ,Cancer Research ,medicine.medical_specialty ,Desmoplastic small-round-cell tumor ,medicine.medical_treatment ,rare disease ,Review ,chemotherapy ,lcsh:RC254-282 ,Receptor tyrosine kinase ,Pazopanib ,surgery ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Internal medicine ,Medicine ,Target therapy ,radiotherapy ,Chemotherapy ,biology ,treatment ,target therapy ,Sunitinib ,business.industry ,allergology ,Multimodal therapy ,medicine.disease ,lcsh:Neoplasms. Tumors. Oncology. Including cancer and carcinogens ,desmoplastic small round cell tumor ,3. Good health ,Radiation therapy ,030104 developmental biology ,030220 oncology & carcinogenesis ,Cancer research ,biology.protein ,tyrosine kinase receptor ,Sarcoma ,prognosis ,business ,medicine.drug ,Rare disease - Abstract
Simple Summary Desmoplastic small round cell tumor is a rare neoplasm with extremely aggressive behavior. Despite the multimodal treatment for newly diagnosed patients with chemotherapy, cytoreductive surgery and radiation, the cure rate is still low. For relapsed or progressive disease, there is limited data regarding second and third-line therapies. Novel agents have shown only modest activity. Recent molecular changes have been identified in this disease and this opens opportunities to be explored in future clinical trials. Abstract Desmoplastic small round cell tumor (DSRCT) is an extremely rare, aggressive sarcoma affecting adolescents and young adults with male predominance. Generally, it originates from the serosal surface of the abdominal cavity. The hallmark characteristic of DSRCT is the EWSR1–WT1 gene fusion. This translocation up-regulates the expression of PDGFRα, VEGF and other proteins related to tumor and vascular cell proliferation. Current management of DSRCT includes a combination of chemotherapy, radiation and aggressive cytoreductive surgery plus intra-peritoneal hyperthermic chemotherapy (HIPEC). Despite advances in multimodal therapy, outcomes remain poor since the majority of patients present disease recurrence and die within three years. The dismal survival makes DSRCT an orphan disease with an urgent need for new drugs. The treatment of advanced and recurrent disease with tyrosine kinase inhibitors, such as pazopanib, sunitinib, and mTOR inhibitors was evaluated by small trials. Recent studies using comprehensive molecular profiling of DSRCT identified potential therapeutic targets. In this review, we aim to describe the current studies conducted to better understand DSRCT biology and to explore the new therapeutic strategies under investigation in preclinical models and in early phase clinical trials.
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