Baylor College of Medicine
Dana Benson
Malignant pleural mesothelioma is a deadly malignancy caused by asbestos that affects more than 3,000 individuals in the United States each year. The five-year survival of mesothelioma has increased to about 10 percent at five years with aggressive multimodality therapy, but a report published in Nature Genetics provides new hope for more effective treatments.
Dr. David Sugarbaker, professor of surgery and director of the Mesothelioma Treatment Center and Lung Institute at Baylor College of Medicine, co-authored this study with physician-researchers from the International Mesothelioma Program at Brigham and Women's Hospital, a program founded by Sugarbaker.
The Baylor College of Medicine Human Genome Sequencing Center currently provides genetic testing for patients seen at the Mesothelioma Treatment Center in Houston.
“The Baylor Human Genome Sequencing Center, one of the nation’s largest genomic centers, will provide a powerful platform with which we will continue to investigate and identify potentially actionable new mutations. We will continue to move aggressively to provide this analysis to our patients coming to the MTC in order to pursue more effective therapies for every patient,” said Sugarbaker.