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4 treatment settings, 4 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 with acinar markers; CT staging; germline testing and comprehensive tumour sequencing with fusion detection for every patient.
Endoscopes with an ultrasound probe on the tip, passed down the gullet or windpipe, that see through the wall of the gut or airway to stage tumours and guide a needle into lymph nodes and the pancreas without an operation.
A CT scan is a fast 3D X-ray that shows the size and shape of tumours and whether they have spread.
A test of the DNA you were born with, to find inherited risk genes such as BRCA or Lynch syndrome.
Sequencing hundreds of cancer genes at once from a biopsy to find the mutations a drug can target.
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.
Pancreatoduodenectomy or distal pancreatectomy even for large tumours, with adjuvant chemotherapy by extrapolation from ductal adenocarcinoma, usually a fluoropyrimidine and oxaliplatin regimen.
FOLFOX is the workhorse chemotherapy combination for bowel cancer, used after surgery to cure and in advanced disease as the backbone that targeted drugs are added to.
FOLFIRINOX is a four-drug chemotherapy combination that, in 2011, became the first treatment to meaningfully extend life in metastatic pancreatic cancer; it is now the standard before and after surgery.
No trial record is attached to this row yet. The trials tab lists what is recruiting and the landmark trials for this cancer.
No side-effect rates or interaction flags are recorded for these options yet. The side-effect lookup and interaction checker cover the products that have them.
Add these to your appointment list, or take the full question set for this cancer.
FOLFOX or FOLFIRINOX preferred over gemcitabine-based regimens on retrospective evidence; resection of the primary and limited metastases considered after response.
FOLFOX is the workhorse chemotherapy combination for bowel cancer, used after surgery to cure and in advanced disease as the backbone that targeted drugs are added to.
FOLFIRINOX is a four-drug chemotherapy combination that, in 2011, became the first treatment to meaningfully extend life in metastatic pancreatic cancer; it is now the standard before and after surgery.
The platinum drug that works in bowel cancer where cisplatin does not, the 'OX' in FOLFOX and CAPOX; its cost is nerve damage in hands and feet.
The 1957 chemotherapy that remains the backbone of treatment for bowel, stomach, pancreatic, anal, head and neck and breast cancers, and as a cream for skin precancers.
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.
MEK inhibition for BRAF fusions on case-series evidence; platinum and PARP inhibitors for homologous recombination defects; pembrolizumab for mismatch repair deficiency.
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.
Olaparib was the first PARP inhibitor, and turned an inherited BRCA mutation from a risk factor into a drug target, including after surgery in breast cancer.
Pembrolizumab is a PD-1 blocking antibody approved in more than 40 settings, from melanoma and lung cancer to the first tumour-agnostic approval for mismatch-repair-deficient tumours in 2017, and before and after surgery in triple-negative breast cancer. A subcutaneous form arrived in 2025, and it is the backbone partner for ADCs and personalised neoantigen vaccines.
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+ |
|---|---|---|
| Anaemia · OlympiA adjuvant, n=911 | 24% | 9% |
| Neutropenia · OlympiA adjuvant, n=911 | 16% | 5% |
| Leukopenia · OlympiA adjuvant, n=911 | 17% | 3% |
| Fatigue · OlympiA adjuvant, n=911 | 42% | 1.8% |
Rates from the label or pivotal trial as recorded on the product page; each grade 3+ figure links to its source.
| Side effect | Any grade | Grade 3+ |
|---|---|---|
| Hypothyroidism (immune-mediated) · Pooled monotherapy data, >2,800 patients | 8% | - |
| Pneumonitis (immune-mediated) · Pooled monotherapy data, >2,800 patients | 3.4% | - |
| Colitis (immune-mediated) · Pooled monotherapy data, >2,800 patients | 1.7% | - |
| Hepatitis (immune-mediated) · Pooled monotherapy data, >2,800 patients | 0.7% | - |
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.