WIN 2016
Precision cancer medicine in Korea
Dr Chang-Sik Yu - ASAN Medical Center, Seoul, Korea
My talk in this WIN symposium is the current status of genomic based precision cancer medicine in Korea. Until last year we had very complex regulatory issues in introducing novel technology such as genomic analysis for cancer to clinical settings. Various governmental agencies and organisations have taken different roles for that. Fortunately, however, in this year the government recognised the need for a one stop service in new medical technology assessment so a flagship project launched in this year to simplify and facilitate the process.
Meanwhile, the ASAN Cancer Institute established the Centre for Cancer Genome Discovery in 2011 and the Centre for Precision Cancer Medicine in 2012. It was the first in Korea. As a result our institute was designated as the first national NGS based clinical testing laboratory system for cancer. Our system will be a prototype of genome based precision cancer medicine in Korea.
What are you looking forward to discussing?
The precision cancer medicine is a cutting edge paradigm for treating cancer patients but region by region they have different problems so we’re going to discuss the problems to implement the precision cancer medicine for patients. In Korea, in my country, we have many hurdles to implement that kind of cutting edge treatment. We have very short new drugs and we have some problems in regulatory issues so we’re going to talk about those kinds of issues.
What have been the most interesting topics at WIN 2016?
In this year the WIN symposium was very superb. I heard many new ideas and information about precision medicine, not only in the cancer field but also whole medicine. So I’m going to try to adapt the new concept to treating daily my patients.
What do you think we should be focussing on in the future?
Collaboration between academia and industry and patient advocacy is very crucial to improve our outcomes with precision cancer medicine. So we have to try developing some collaborative process between stakeholders.
