More accurate disease classification now means some young children with neuroblastoma will have less intensive treatment with better survival, according to research published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
In a pan-European trial, researchers found that screening the tumours of children under the age of one with advanced neuroblastoma for a gene called MYCN could save them from unnecessary chemotherapy.
The number of MYCN genes are known to be increased in about 25 per cent of neuroblastomas. Tumours with increased numbers of this gene behave much more aggressively.
In this trial, 96 per cent of patients whose neuroblastoma had spread to distant parts of the body but did not have the amplified gene survived five years or more with little or no treatment.
Neuroblastoma affects around 90 children each year in the UK and across the board, five year survival rates are around 60 per cent. Around 30 children under the age of one are diagnosed with neuroblastoma each year in the UK.
The study was led by Cancer Research UK's Professor of Paediatric Oncology Professor Andy Pearson at the Institute of Cancer Research and the Royal Marsden Hospital in Sutton with Dr Mary Gerrard at Sheffield Children's Hospital and conducted by researchers from the International Society of Paediatric Oncology Europe Neuroblastoma Group (SIOPEN) and the Children's Cancer and Leukaemia Group (CCLG).
They treated 170 babies from nine European countries with neuroblastoma that had spread to distant parts of the body – but who did not have the amplified MYCN gene in their tumours.
These children were treated with up to four courses of chemotherapy. Some children were treated with surgery first if their doctors felt they needed it.
Previously, these children would have been treated with up to 12 courses of chemotherapy.