Crizotinib as a personalized alternative for targeted anaplastic lymphoma kinase rearrangement in previously treated patients with non-small-cell lung cancer.

Crizotinib, the first clinically designed and synthesized as a tyrosine kinase inhibitor targeting mesenchymal-epithelial transition factor, indicating marked anticancer activity in patients with advanced, anaplastic lymphoma kinase-positive non-small-cell lung cancer, was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in 2011. In this review, we focus on the efficacy of crizotinib compared with chemotherapy in advanced anaplastic lymphoma kinase-positive lung cancer and present the role of crizotinib as a personalized alternative in previously treated patients with non-small-cell lung cancer.