Rome sits down with Stephane Budel, Founding Partner at Decibio, a premier strategy consulting firm dedicated to advancing precision medicine. This conversation aims to demystify the complex world of NGS testing, providing patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals with a clearer understanding of how these powerful tools are revolutionizing cancer prevention, treatment, and long-term management.
Stephane offers a comprehensive overview of the NGS testing landscape, detailing its various applications from identifying hereditary cancer risks and early detection, to guiding personalized treatment with comprehensive genomic profiling (CGP) and monitoring disease recurrence (MRD testing). They candidly discuss the persistent challenges in NGS adoption, which include lack of insurance coverage, and integrating these technologies into routine clinical workflows, particularly in community settings.
Key Takeaways:
- NGS Transforms Cancer Care: Next-Generation Sequencing is crucial for shifting from a reactive “sick care” model to proactive, precision medicine to prevent cancer. By enabling earlier detection and highly personalized treatments, NGS significantly improves patient outcomes, particularly when cancer is caught in its earliest stages.
- A Spectrum of NGS Tests: Patients have access to various NGS applications throughout their cancer journey, including germline testing for hereditary risk, early detection tests (e.g., multi-cancer early detection blood tests), comprehensive genomic profiling (CGP) for treatment selection, and monitoring (MRD) tests for tracking disease and recurrence.
- The Future of Cancer Care: The integration of AI and multiomics (analyzing DNA, RNA, and proteins) will enhance diagnostic accuracy, personalize therapeutic strategies, streamline clinical workflows, and unlock deeper biological insights, further optimizing patient care in the coming years.
