Is anyone familiar with EXaCT1 testing or other Whole Exome Sequencing?
Did you have it done? What did it tell you that you already didn't know about your cancer? How did it help guide you through treatment options?
Here is what is on Weill-Cornell's website about it:
Whole Exome Sequencing by Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) has emerged as an efficient strategy to selectively sequence the coding regions of the genome as a more-cost effective alternative to whole genome sequencing. This new approach allows for the identification of numerous gene variations that may yield information about your cancer's development, prognosis and any potential targeted therapies that currently exist.
Unlike focused tests, typically called panel sequencing, the EXaCT-1 assay takes an unbiased, exploratory look at more than 20,000 genes in both healthy and malignant cells, allowing molecular pathologists to find alterations in the cancer-development process in unexpected regions of the exome. This type of test, known as whole exome sequencing, can be effective in advanced-stage patients for whom other treatments have failed because it uncovers mutations that the less comprehensive tests miss. In practice, this means, for example, that a patient with bladder cancer whom EXaCT-1 shows to share a mutation associated with breast cancer might benefit from a drug typically prescribed to fight the latter type of tumor.