Loading
5 treatment settings, 5 with more than one named option. Each section lays out the options the standard of care names, what each is for, the trials behind them with their recorded results, the side effects and cautions on record, and questions to ask. Built from the cancer page's standard-of-care rows; nothing here is advice for your case.
Biopsy of an accessible lesion with BRAF V600E testing and broader sequencing; FDG-PET/CT, cardiac and brain MRI, endocrine assessment.
Sequencing hundreds of cancer genes at once from a biopsy to find the mutations a drug can target.
FDG PET is the standard PET scan. A radioactive sugar shows which tissues are burning glucose fast, which most cancers do.
MRI uses a strong magnet and radio waves, with no ionising radiation, to picture soft tissue in finer contrast than CT, so it is the standard scan for brain tumours, prostate, rectal cancer staging, liver lesions and breast screening in high-risk women. It is slow, expensive and blurred by movement.
A blood test that reads fragments of DNA shed by the tumour, so you can genotype or monitor cancer without a needle in the tumour.
No trial record is attached to this row yet. The trials tab lists what is recruiting and the landmark trials for this cancer.
Add these to your appointment list, or take the full question set for this cancer.
Vemurafenib (approved 2017) or dabrafenib with trametinib; cobimetinib as an alternative; dose reduction to limit toxicity, treatment continued long term.
Vemurafenib was the first BRAF inhibitor (2011); it shrank melanomas in weeks and proved that a single mutation could be drugged in a solid tumour.
Dabrafenib plus trametinib is the BRAF-plus-MEK pill combination, approved for BRAF V600E lung cancer and, since 2022, for any solid tumour with that mutation.
Cobimetinib is the MEK partner for vemurafenib, and the first drug approved for histiocytic neoplasms.
Pills that block the specific enzyme a cancer relies on. Imatinib in 2001 proved a cancer could be switched off by design.
No trial record is attached to this row yet. The trials tab lists what is recruiting and the landmark trials for this cancer.
| Side effect | Any grade | Grade 3+ |
|---|---|---|
| Arthralgia | 53% | - |
| Photosensitivity | 33% | - |
| Cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma / keratoacanthoma · BRIM-3 vemurafenib arm | 24% | - |
Rates from the label or pivotal trial as recorded on the product page; each grade 3+ figure links to its source.
Add these to your appointment list, or take the full question set for this cancer.
Cobimetinib (approved 2022 for histiocytic neoplasms); trametinib as an alternative MEK inhibitor.
Cobimetinib is the MEK partner for vemurafenib, and the first drug approved for histiocytic neoplasms.
Pills that block the specific enzyme a cancer relies on. Imatinib in 2001 proved a cancer could be switched off by design.
No trial record is attached to this row yet. The trials tab lists what is recruiting and the landmark trials for this cancer.
Add these to your appointment list, or take the full question set for this cancer.
Interferon alfa or pegylated interferon, anakinra, cladribine, methotrexate.
Interferon alfa was the first biologic cancer drug (1986). It treated hairy cell leukaemia, CML, melanoma, kidney cancer and Kaposi sarcoma, and has been replaced almost everywhere by better-tolerated agents.
A one-week infusion that puts most people with hairy cell leukaemia into remission for years; also used in multiple sclerosis in tablet form.
The 1948 antifolate that produced the first chemotherapy remissions in childhood leukaemia and the first cure of a solid tumour; still essential in ALL, lymphoma, osteosarcoma and CNS lymphoma.
No trial record is attached to this row yet. The trials tab lists what is recruiting and the landmark trials for this cancer.
Add these to your appointment list, or take the full question set for this cancer.
Observation with periodic PET and organ screening.
FDG PET is the standard PET scan. A radioactive sugar shows which tissues are burning glucose fast, which most cancers do.
For low-risk prostate cancer, monitoring with PSA, MRI, and repeat biopsy instead of treating, because most such cancers never cause harm.
No trial record is attached to this row yet. The trials tab lists what is recruiting and the landmark trials for this cancer.
Add these to your appointment list, or take the full question set for this cancer.