Genetically targeted therapy is a recent cancer treatment method in which specific genes and proteins are targeted by drugs that help cancer cells grow and survive.
Targeted therapy affects the tissue environment of cancer cells and inhibits their growth such as blood vessel cells.
Based on somatic mutation theory , the scientific community believed genes and its mutations are the prime reason for cancer. From this they delivered the remarkable drugs imatinib and trastuzumab . Overall five genetically targeted medications are useful in terms of survival rate during fifty years of genetic research.
The exact problem in cancer medications from genetically targeted therapy is drug resistance . Constant changing of genetic targets will occur when we try to target a gene with a drug, as cancer cells activate different genes to bypass the blocked pathway.
It is the strength of a cancer cell as it can mutate around when we try to block and it does better than anything else. It is so tiresome to find all other mutations when we tried to block a single mutation to stop the cancer growth is not successful. We need to work on the weakness of cancer rather than on its strength.
Finally, the scientific community tried to accept that genetic mutations can explain how cancer keeps growing but they do not explain the basic doubt of why these genes are mutated. We always explore the inward constraints of genes rather than outward ones of the environment.
We have so many attributes in the environment towards cancer risk such as tobacco smoke, radiation, infections and the least explored one is the diet as these factors largely rely within our control.
Even though a lot of research and success from the genetically targeted therapy towards cancer care by knowing the gene mutation and its mechanisms. Most of the known risk of cancer is due to environmental factors, not genes. So if we strategically plan and execute the changes in our environmental factors, we will be able to see a better healthy society in future.
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