Transcript
Tissue biopsy is the standard for biomarker testing.
An alternative approach is liquid biopsy, which is a minimally invasive method for detection of biomarkers and can be advantageous when tissue biopsy is not feasible or when the tissue sample collected is insufficient.
In patients with non small cell lung cancer, NSCLC tissue and liquid biopsy based biomarker testing have high concordance.
To reflect the rapidly evolving biomarker testing landscape, a 2021 IASLC consensus statement integrated liquid biopsy based testing into their diagnostic decision making algorithm... for advanced NSCLC to increase biomarker detection rates.
A positive tissue or liquid biopsy result for actionable biomarkers may be sufficient to start a targeted treatment plan, but negative liquid biopsy results are inconclusive and need a tissue biopsy follow up.