Long Term Clinical Implications of PLGG Molecular Subgroups

Pediatric low grade gliomas possess the dichotomy of excellent (greater than 90%) short term overall survival with very low (less than 40%) progression-free survival leading to the following major clinical challenges: Multiple recurrences resulting in accumulation of toxic therapies, significant but extremely variable long term morbidity resulting in late mortality, and multiple pathological subgroups lumped together resulting in lack of specific and targeted therapies. In this project, in order to address these issues, Dr. Uri Tabori and colleagues at Sick Kids of Toronto hypothesize that uncovering RAS/MAPK alterations in all PLGG subtypes as well as secondary events in these cancers will enable novel molecular risk stratification of PLGG. This novel classification will guide current and future targeted therapies which are becoming available for these tumors.

Funded in 2015.