When I started fellowship training in the year 2000, the response from everyone when I mentioned my interest in lung cancer was nearly the same: “Are you sure?”
20 Years of EGFR
May 2024 marked the 20th anniversary of the publication of papers on the role of the EGFR mutation in lung cancer. This is a seminal event that changed the history of this disease and that can be traced back to one reason why cancer mortality has been declining in the US.
The Cancer Letter and the Cancer History Project explore this development in a comprehensive multimedia series consisting of opinion pieces, our in-real-time-coverage, historical documents, and interviews with scientists, clinicians, drug regulators, and cancer survivors.
This multimedia series is guest-edited by Suresh S. Ramalingam, a lung cancer expert, executive director of Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University, and editor-in-chief of the journal Cancer.
At a time when funding for cancer research is decreasing, the EGFR series focuses on the scientific and regulatory processes and enhances awareness of the importance of cancer research and its ability to save lives.
On Sept. 24, 2002, the Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee recommended an accelerated approval for AstraZeneca’s Iressa (gefitinib). The recommendation concluded a meeting where ODAC weighed whether the drug, an EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor, could benefit patients with resistant or refractory non-small cell lung cancer as a third-line therapy.
On Sept. 24, 2002, when I showed up at a meeting of the FDA Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee, I had a pretty good idea that the drug on the agenda—AstraZeneca’s Iressa (gefitinib)—was having a surprising effect on some patients in third-line non-small cell lung cancer.
In 1998, lung cancer was the leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States, with 160,000 deaths per year. That statistic inspired Matthew Meyerson, who would soon start working at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, to specialize in lung cancer.
Twenty years ago, the discovery of epidermal growth factor receptor mutations as drivers of tumorigenesis and viable targets for therapeutic intervention marked the beginning of a new era in lung cancer diagnosis and treatment. Since then, the field has made remarkable progress towards developing more effective targeted treatments and immunotherapies that have significantly improved patient outcomes and survival.
Two decades after uncovering the role of EGFR mutations in lung cancer, scientists are still grappling with lingering research questions.
Christy Erickson was seven years old when her mom lost a three-year battle with breast cancer.
